Well, it is Christmas today. For the most part it is not a day I particularly care for but, like the other 364 days in the year, it will roll around regardless of my opinion of it. So, well others are busy doing their thing and making whatever merry they want, I’m cocooning into my house, listening to the quiet as I tinker at bits and pieces of house work, updating some badly neglected blogs, including this one and maybe even reading some of that email archived in my inbox.

Now, don’t get the idea that I’m Scrooge or anything. I just find that being on my own that the whole family thing at Christmas just doesn’t happen. Yeah, I could be at my sister’s place or even my oldest brother’s but you know, no matter how much they include you, you are still the outsider. This year, I decided I just wasn’t into grinning and bearing it. So, I’m staying home. Tomorrow I’ll go to a friend’s place for lunch, which I’m looking forward to. I always enjoy spending time with her.

This year has been a rather busy one in many ways and not busy enough in other ways. On the not busy enough side, that is my income which is down considerably and being out of commission for most of November with bronchitis didn’t help matters much. But, that’s water under the bridge and tomorrow is another day.. so to speak.

On the busy side, that would be in the volunteer side of life. As in the past, my involvement with my church continues. I am still sitting on Area Council but I think this year will be the last that I’ll be able to do that. I have to be off for I think at least 2 years before I can rejoin. I’ll miss that actually, it has been rather interesting to learn a lot more about how the church works at the next level from the parish.

The parish welcomed a new priest this year. She arrived in May, after we’d been more or less on our own for 18 months. As always there has been a transition period as both the parish leadership and her get used to each other and come to understand each other. Initially we had a bit of a sense that she was quite prepared to just ignore our wishes and our past practices and impose her own will but over time she has started to listen more and seems to appear to see us more as allies than adversaries. That always makes the working relationship a whole lot easier.

Just about the time that the priest was arriving and getting settled in at the church, I developed a set of rocks in my head (not medically proven but likely as there is no other sane reason) and decided to once again stand as President of the local Legion. The challenges to this position are great, not because others aspire to hold that office, more because they not only didn’t aspire to hold the position of President, but it was like pulling teeth to get good people to take any position.

The Branch has been financially struggling for a few years now and a certain apathy had set in that it was just a matter of time. I saw things a tad bit different. I felt that the demise of the branch on a financial basis wasn’t inevitable. It would be inevitable if the members continued to take it for granted and not be willing to put any sweat equity into their membership. In a way, I understood the apathy in that members were wary of putting energy into keeping the place going and it failed anyways. I needed a few people to commit to trying for at least a year.

Thankfully it didn’t take long to show results. We undertook an ambitious schedule of events with a small group of people. We’ve had some glitches along the way and will continue to, but all in all, we’re really looking pretty good. We do have to get more people to get involved, to be willing to give some time towards keeping the place up and running. That will be the biggest struggle we’ll have going forward.

So, today and tomorrow (Boxing Day), I’m taking me time to do things I want to do and come Thursday I’ll have to start worrying about January’s events starting with New Years Eve. For now, I’ll say cya so I can move onto doing some other entries. Oh, did I mention… got to get the turkey in the oven. One of the perks of staying home, turkey leftovers.