Christmas Card 2022

For those of you who know me well, my Christmas Card is early this year! Some years it doesn’t make it out until March!

For those of you with whom I am more recently acquainted… Yes! I do understand that it is a very strange thing to receive a Christmas Card in February! (It doesn’t really ever go out as late as March… well, once maybe! 🙂 ) But it has become a bit of a tradition over these last few decades that it arrives in midwinter…

It is my wish to send a special gift – something from my heart – to celebrate the Joy of the Holiday Season, and to remind us to keep cognizant of the Spirit of Love and Kindness throughout the year! I am a great believer in the power of words. Since my teen years, I would collect quotes and stories about Christmas and send them out to everyone as my Christmas Card. Eventually, I began to write my own original stories. (This, as it turns out, takes even longer! 🙂 )

I am inspired by the experience of each Christmas Holiday Season and every year, I am stirred by its beautiful values. I love to celebrate and savor the time… I usually don’t get to baking until some mid-January weekend. I capture whatever bits of Christmas Magic I can throughout the winter and weave them into a story that I hope will delight you and lift your spirit whenever you may read it!

So, you may choose to dismiss this as, “Oh, that Crazy Guy is sending out Christmas Cards in February again!” or you may choose to receive it in the spirit in which it is sent: May you enjoy all of the Magic and Sparkle and Beauty of the many Gifts of Christmas (Peace on Earth! Good Will toward Everyone! Love and Kindness, Compassion, Generosity and Cheer! Wassail! Wassail!) Boy, oh Boy! Could we ever use more of those things now…

I hope that you will appreciate this years’ story: It is the story five brothers. Perhaps you have met some of them already. And it is about the importance, and sometimes the difficulties and challenges, of sharing the unique gifts we bring to the world!

So please, if you will, make yourself your favorite warm beverage – a Hot Cacao is always nice! – sit back this lovely day or evening, allow yourself a brief respite,  and have a nice read, enjoying the magic, wonder and delight of “Five Brothers’ Unique Gifts…” (more…)

My Strong, Good, Courageous, Positive-Thinking, Magical Marvelous Friend! Part I

As soon as the call came through, the airplane cabin was flooded with light coming through my window

There is nothing quite like that call.
When someone is not well, or elderly, or in hospice care, and you get that call from their next of kin.
It may come in the form of a voicemail, their saddened shell-shocked voice asking simply to return the phone call. And of course, you know what’s happened, but they feel it’s impolite to leave such potentially devastating news on a voicemail.
And they are right about that.
It is certainly better to deliver such news in person.
It may come as a voicemail message delivering the news and requiring no return call, ‘She’s gone.’ I’ve been on the receiving end of that one, as well.
It may come as the name of their next of kin lights up on your cell phone screen, and you answer it, even as you are seated on a plane about to take off…
That’s what happened this time.
“This is the call you’ve been waiting for,” she began, her voice a combination of the triumph and weariness of Acceptance, when one has completed that final Journey with a Loved One.

My friend had been in hospice care for several weeks —
My Strong, Good, Courageous, Positive-Thinking, Magical Marvelous Friend!
My Incredible Friend who was so shy about social media and asked to never have pictures of herself posted here.
I shall not go against her wishes, now.
Ah, but how I wish I could show you!
(more…)

Crazy Grateful

Crazy Grateful!
I am Crazy Grateful today!

Ten Months ago, we received some tragic news.
My Partner’s MOM had had a massive heart attack.
She has been in a Vegetative State since then.
Lots of Prayers…
Lots of Hope… (more…)

  • Follow Live The Questions Now on WordPress.com
  • Life Adventure

  • Some Good Movies

    IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE
    THE SIXTH SENSE
    SAINT RALPH
    I AM
    PRIDE
    THE GOOD LIE
    MAO'S LAST DANCER
    MR. SMITH GOES TO WASHINGTON
    CALENDAR GIRLS
    WALK ON WATER
    CINEMA PARADISO
    SLIDING DOORS
    THE LIVES OF OTHERS
    LOCAL COLOR
    BREAKING THE WAVES
    EVERYBODY'S FINE
    READY? OK
    INKHEART
    THE LIVING END
    MARRIAGE, ITALIAN STYLE
    THE BUBBLE
    BIUTIFUL
    GYPSY w/ ROSALIND RUSSELL
    and Anything by PETER HEDGES

  • Arnold J. Mungioli