Christmas Colds and Convictions

I'm alive...barely. I have spend these last 48 hours with what can only be described as a cold from hell. I hesitate to even refer to it as a cold because that just doesn't do justice to the horror it has put me through. I'm feeling slightly better now but there were times when I really thought it would be better if I just died. I didn't feel that great over the weekend but Monday morning I was okay so I went ahead and did all my errands while Craig was working. But by mid-afternoon, it came again, stronger than ever. So my Christmas Eve was not spent at a lovely almost midnight service at church and my Christmas day was not spent eating my Christmas ham and Christmas green bean casserole and my Christmas afternoon was not spent playing games at a blogging friend's house. No, it was spent downing cold medicine. Gone were my hopes for a our first Christmas morning to be a romantic event spent opening our presents and watching old Frank Capra movies. No, the most romantic part of yesterday was when I laid down on the floor of the bathroom while Craig took a shower so that I could finally breathe a bit. And to tell you the truth, while it was steamy, it wasn't very romantic (but it did remind me that I need to clean the bathroom floor).

At first I was kind of bitter. Not only did I not get to spend Christmas with my family, but Craig's one day off this week was spent wasted because I was sick. But then I had an attitude adjustment, and not just because I was high on cold medicine. No, because I realized that I still had a lot to be grateful for. I have a great husband. One who didn't complain when instead of a nice meal, he got to make himself a grilled cheese for dinner. One who didn't mind driving around last night trying to find someplace that sold medicine and was open - even before he knew he would be able to pick up a 6-pack at the same place. And it was only our first Christmas. We have plenty more to enjoy in the future. Christmas morning where we can sleep in. Christmas mornings with kids waking us up at 6 in the morning wanting to rush downstairs. Christmas mornings where we have to drag our teenagers out of their beds and force them to be festive whether they want to be or not. And Christmas mornings where our kids come home with their kids to celebrate. And each one is a chance for me to remember that part of Christmas that doesn't ever change - the gift that God has given us. Some people say that Easter is more important than Christmas but I have to disagree. Yes, Easter is important, I'm not going to deny that. But it isn't just that Jesus died for us. It's that he knows what it is like to be a human and live in a human body. Bodies kinda stink. There he was, omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient and he gave all that up to be made into a human where he has to deal with things like colds and zits (but not PMS, even Jesus didn't have to deal with PMS). I take a lot of comfort in knowing that God knows what it is like to be a human because he has been one himself. He did all that and much more, just for us, just for me. So when I got to thinking about all that, I realized that it didn't matter if our first Christmas together isn't all that I had planned. Plus I get another chance to celebrate when we head off on Friday to visit Craig's family in North Dakota so hopefully that one goes better.