and so i’m here in this room only lit by a giant decorated tree.  this was the first christmas that i started to ponder how strange it is for us to bring something into the middle of our house that actually belongs in a forest, throw lights and a strange assortment of knick knacks on it, and sit back and say, “how beautiful.”

we’re odd creatures but correct in our feelings.  this strange behavior really does produce beauty.

i just wish there was more time to enjoy it.

and i just wish i had more time to write 2010. i just got that one down and here we are about to change again.  2011. i shall have to practice.  the good news is that although i know that i’ll continue writing 2010 for several more months, 2011 is going to be greeted in a much more pleasant fashion than 2010 was from me.

last year was a hard transition.  i needed a new beginning and a new place to start fresh dreams but — well, would it make sense to say that i didn’t want any of that?  i guess that’s natural when everything you had been planning and dreaming is suddenly taken from you and you’re left with an empty heart and empty hands and all you really want are those very things brought back to you.  maybe that run-on sentence doesn’t make sense to you but it does to me.  and that’s where i was at the end of 2009.  a stupid little girl who didn’t want new but wanted what she had at one point.

and for a whole year i’ve been coasting as i watched God take my broken self and mend it to the very core.  2010 cocooned my selfish heart that was convinced God only takes the things we so desperately want (what a skewed perspective i had on such a generous God) and brought about a heart that trusts that He delights in giving us the best things.

perhaps you’re not even reading this rather lengthy entry anymore but all this is to say that 2010 was good to me.  it was needed. it’s made me ready to take on a new season — ready to open my eyes to possibilities and dream a little.

because God is good and His plans are for good.  and my heart knows.