Today I’m grateful for my merry house.

11.26.2023

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Today was an exhausting day. After several slow-paced, relaxing, stress-free days, I kicked it into high gear today. I have a ton to do in the next couple days and because I spent the last several days relaxing, today had a heavy cloud of responsibility and stress hanging over it.

In addition to a whole bunch of school to-dos, high on today’s priority list was hanging my outdoor Christmas lights. I’ve been wanting to decorate for Christmas since September and it’s kind of killing me that I haven’t done it yet. I wasn’t sure I was going to get to all my indoor décor today, but at the very least I was committed to getting my outside lights up. I sprang into action pretty much as soon as I got up this morning, so I knocked this task out by 8:00 a.m.

From then on out, I pretty much went non-stop all day today. I cleaned out my refrigerator. I organized part of my garage. I sent several emails. I washed my car. I got gas and dropped off another box of stuff at Goodwill. I returned several Amazon items. I got home from running errands just in time to turn around and leave again for choir rehearsal and Mass. Like I said – go, go, go.

Driving home from church this evening, my to-do list was still hanging over my head. Pulling onto my street and into my driveway, I was trying to decide what I could accomplish yet tonight and still get to bed at a decent hour. Open up my work laptop and get work stuff done? Finish folding laundry? Pack my lunch for tomorrow? My mind was so consumed with what I needed to get done, that I almost didn’t notice my outdoor Christmas lights had turned on while I was gone. I’d actually kind of forgotten that I’d hung them this morning.

I stopped my car and sat in the driveway for a minute, just looking at them. The lights made me really happy. Then, after I parked my car in the garage, I went and stood in the middle of the street for a minute, just breathing in the cool air and admiring the lights. It occurred to me that, aside from church, this was probably the stillest I’d been all day.

I did knock another item or two off my list yet tonight. I decided to leave my work laptop closed until tomorrow, so the Sunday Scaries are still looming a bit as I anticipate a heavy workload tomorrow. But, it’ll all be okay. Things always get done – at least the important ones do. And today it was important to me that I got my Christmas lights hung. And so I did. It was also important that I snap out of high gear for a few minutes tonight to simply just stand still and admire my merry house. And so I did that, too.