Merry Christmas!
It's that most wonderful day of the year. This morning I got up, watched a little TV, and went to church - the service was an hour later than normal because it was going to be just the one service for the morning, but that's OK. I'm flexible. And during the service, I remembered something the Senior Pastor had said several years before - on my first Christmas without my family. He had said "Be conscious of who is around you today - realize that today is the worst day someone's ever had. And it's also the best day someone else has ever had."
This morning, as I was texting all my family and friends, I realized what my recovery meant to me. It's that both those days - the best and the worst - were happening every day for me. There wasn't a day that I live now that isn't plagued with what I've lost. How my wife and kids simply can't stand me - and yet they will not tell me why.
"I never really loved you... You were just a better alternative than moving back home [after college]" - that was all I was ever going to get. The kids even less.
But at the same time, I still loved them, and wished them well.
I took presents over to my two youngest this week, and they took them and shut the door. I had asked them if there was anything they wanted - no response. I text them weekly, Sunday mornings, in fact, and nothing.
Yet today is also the very best day of my life. I could get up and go to this wonderful church. I could feel that I'm actually worth something. I could sit and create systems that make me feel the beauty and grace of all living things is in front of me when I do this - and it is a joy like none I've ever felt.
And it always has been.
So today I've realized that my life now is that every day is both the best day I've ever had, and the worst day I've ever had. It's not that it makes anything better, but to me, it explains so much. Why I can be happy about what I'm creating at work, and be so close to tears about what is not - and never likely will be again.
To understand our situation is to take the first steps of coming to terms with it - making peace with it. I hope that comes... but I'm not expecting it. Understanding is good enough for today.
Merry Christmas!