the season

what a season.

when i was a kid, i just loved it.
i loved it for a very long time.

then it got hard.
and then i saw a lot of sadness all around me.

i wondered how i had gone so long with not really
seein' all of that....really seein'.
so many people hurting.

then i wavered and wasn't sure i loved the season
anymore.

and then i came back to it.
i'm back to loving it.
but in an entirely different way.

i have my own hard stuff the season brings out.
and i think with bone sighs now too, i see a whole lot
more pain than i used to. just people comin' thru
and talkin' and sharin'. some REALLY hard stuff.

so there's a big part of the season that's hard.
but here's the cool thing.....
there's a big part of the season that's beautiful.

i wrote something the other day about love.
when i wrote it, i was thinking about relationships.
but this morning it occurs to me that it could be life too....

here, look.
here's what i wrote about relationships:

easy. pretty, romantic, fun, smooth.
those were the words she had hoped love was.
and yeah – they were there.
but so were hard, work, hurt, frustration.
and she finally understood.
love was what was there no matter which other word showed up.


now....let's take 'romantic' out just cause that'll muddy
the waters. and let's put 'life' in for 'love':

easy. pretty, fun, smooth.
those were the words she had hoped life was.
and yeah – they were there.
but so were hard, work, hurt, frustration.
and she finally understood.
life was what was there no matter which other word showed up.

life/love....i hope one day for those things to be so the
same thing inside of me.....

and included in all of that mix is the painful.
the stuff i'm hearin' or experience myself this holiday season

and i think what i'm startin' to get is a 'grown up' version
of lovin' the holidays.

knowing it's awful hard.
and knowing it's way beautiful.
and knowing there's something incredible about that.

and somehow....i think that's the whole point of the holiday
season to begin with.

but it took me this long to find it...