Greetings Oh Ramblers,
Let me just take this moment in time to wish you all a Merry Christmas. Don't get me wrong - I am not particularly taken with the whole Jeebus thing, nor am I taken with the whole Santa/Satan capitalist thing, but this is indeed a special time of year to be cherished and raised on a pedestal.
Christmas is the one thing that I have never gotten used to in Australia. I am originally from Denmark, so my idea of Christmas is freezing cold, fireplaces, roast duck and pork, mulled wine, real pine trees, communal bowls of nuts with the cracker always nearby, clementines (a type of mandarine) and snow all around.
35 degrees, prawns on the BBQ, cold salads and beers in the sun just don't seem to capture the spirit of my childhood Christmases.
Having said all that, I must admit to a certain fondness for this time of year. It is a time to get together with family, to eat fine food, to quaff fine wine, and it provides an important bookend to our lives, since we love to compartmentalise and label everything. Christmas and New Year for me, as it is for a lot of people, is a time to reflect on the year that has been and the year that is yet to come. It is a time of delight and of promise.
One of the most important things in life is to gauge where you are, for without personal progress we are just meat robots and oxygen thieves. By relfecting on where you were and where you are, you can exercise the amazing gifts of free will and intellect, and work on the most important job that you will ever have in life - that of personal improvement.
None of us are perfect. I am a particularly flawed individual who needs to do a lot of work to head towards the ideal that I have in my mind's eye. The only way that I can improve myself is to evaluate where I am, and to continue along the path that I have set for myself. Christmas and New Year provides me with the ideal controlled environment to (dare I say it?) scientifically evaluate how I have progressed (or regressed).
As the one or two idle readers of my blog, you may think that I have spent the last year at the edge of despair, ready to jump off the precipice, screaming as I embrace oblivion. However, this is very far from the truth. I am indeed eminently happy. Some of you may have guessed that this blog is just a pressure valve for me to vent my nasty thoughts, in order to stop them from taking over my life. By writing them down, I exorcise them and am free. Very cathartic.
So, take my word for it (as I listen to Mr. T selling his Flavour Wave (and his soul) on late night commercial television in the background) I am trying very hard to ignore the capitalism side of Christmas and see instead the real beauty of a time of togetherness with family and friends.
And, guess what? I am succeeding...
Happy happy joy joy, oh ramblers...
