The holidays are a bit weird for the mdd household. Over the past decade and a half, they have been punctuated by suicide, near death car accident, hospitalization, emotional stress, near foreclosure, job loss, disability, trial separations, blizzards stranding us in foreign countries trying to get home, and to top it all off Mrs mdd's birthday is on December 23.
This year, true to form my father-in-law is riding out this central VA blizzard in the pulmonary ward at Lynchburg General Hospital, fighting off infection, possibly the flu, while saddled with COPD and mental side-effects of poor oxygenation.
With this blizzard, it is only a matter of time that the rural house we (him, me, the missus) live in together will get the power knocked out. So that means no heat, no way to power dad's oxygen concentrator, his C-PAP (which he doesn't use as much as he should), no phone (sketchy cell phone service too) to call for assistance if his condition suddenly went south (as it did 2 days ago), no Playstation to play Mrs mdd's new "Dragon Age" game, no internet to post the gobs of new pootie and woozle pictures I brought down from our Connecticut house for sorting and digitizing (ATTN p/w diaries: many pix of Chesterdog growing up and many of pooties from the past who are now departed).
Yet these are the things that remind me of good fortune: I do have these pictures, I did get back from Connecticut in time to help Mrs mdd get her dad to the hospital where he is safe and warm and getting medical attention, that he does have fantastic government insurance. I was there to support her during her darkest hour of family tragedy as was she during the hour of my greatest need in the ER with two pulverized legs being manually set (one week before we were going to go to Paris for Thanksgiving - sorry, hon). That everyone in the family are proud New York liberals making political talk during holiday meals enjoyable.
And even though the surprise of her birthday gift was ruined by having the contents of the shipping box printed on the outside (a Tauntaun sleeping bag) she is tickled pink, and can't wait to wear it 24/7 (and I thought they smelled bad on the outside!).
So things are. They change, they don't always live up to expectations or even predictability, there are just and noble causes to fight and advocate for, there are disappointments, tragedy, heartbreak, and unfair things happen at inconvenient times, and holidays get ruined, and you step in cat barf first thing in the morning, and you're snowed in, your dog with bad knees and terminal jaw cancer has accidents in the house, your father is in the hospital, and you have a birthday 2 days before Christmas, you will always have my love and loyalty.
Oh, ok. DailyKos, same for you. I'll toss you a virtual group hug for the holiday season and the only useful thing I've learned for coping with adversity:
I promise, things do change. Usually not as fast as you want, but it's like when you have a cold and you feel miserable, and it feels like you're going to feel like shit for the rest of your life. Suddenly, a week or two later, you discover to your surprise that you feel fine and can't believe you were ever sick.
It's not always going to be so dramatic a change, but one day, you're going to feel ok, and that's the day you should remember. Don't dwell on the bad, anticipate and expect that better day. It will come.