Sunday Stealing

1. Where have you found unexpected magic or delight this holiday season?

Our "Christmas" was December 26, the day everyone could get together.  We all met at the theater at 11 a.m. to see the new Star Wars before going home to do Christmas stuff.  I'm not a Star Wars fan and didn't know who was who, but seeing all three of our kids, our two grandkids, our daughters and son-in-law, all gathered together sharing 3 or 4 huge buckets of popcorn and laughing together before the movie started just filled my heart with joy.  I love that our kids are good friends to each other and that they are all good friends of mine as well.

Another bit of unexpected delight came when my mother, who has Alzheimers, started working a puzzle with one of my granddaughters.  My mother used to be a puzzle-working fiend, but that's another talent/interest that Alzheimers has robbed her of.  She didn't work on the puzzle for long, but just seeing her working on a puzzle again was magic.

2. What's your favorite type of holiday gathering? Will you/have you gathered in your favorite way this month?

After the movie, I came home to start dinner and the others wandered around downtown, then everyone came to our house, along with my  mother (who did not go to the movie).  My favorite part of the holidays is getting all the family together and watching the new generation learning the old traditions.

3. Time has named 'The Silence Breakers' (women who came forward with stories of harassment)  'person of the year' for 2017. Would you agree? If not, who do you think deserves the title?

I would mostly agree.  There are lots of opinions about these silence breakers but there is a huge difference between being sexually molested/harassed and someone patting you on the tush. The lines have become very blurred and it is getting absolutely ridiculous.  Serious hard-core abusers/molesters should be exposed, but I have always had problems with Al Franken, who I think was a sacrificial lamb for the issue.  Most important thing is shining light on the issue, but it may backfire.  Will men be uncomfortable hiring women now?  I don't know.  In the short run it was a brave, important thing to do.  In the long run it may have ramifications that nobody anticipated.

4. How did you spend your time this year? Are you happy about that? Elaborate

When I look back on 2017 it seems that my time was divided between ranting and raving about the 45th president and visiting my mother.  Moving her into a memory care unit was one of the best things we did, but watching the disintegration of her brain has been very painful.  She's had fainting spells which have required trips to the ER, so I have become very familiar with that place.

5. Bid farewell to 2017 in ten words or less.

Go away and never, ever come back.

6. Insert your own random thought here.

I started 2018 very depressed at the thought of losing a wonderful president and replacing him with....what we replaced him with.  My depression over the political scene has only increased as I watch the destruction of this country I have loved.  Repealing everything Obama ever did, whether it was protecting the environment, our national parks, our children's education, food for low income families, encouragement of violence among disparate groups, refusing to call out American terrorists, etc., etc., etc.  I have watched more and more as impeachable offenses are ignored, illegal activities ignored, and more and more eroding of everything I was so proud of that Obama did, against the obstruction of the Republicans.  I no longer have hope and that is a terrible way to start a new year.