Merry

Hope everyone had a wonderful Christmakah, and you all got what your heart desires. It's about 12 minutes until my birthday, so before I get even older, some thoughts from me to you.

If you're able to read this, you are more fortunate than most of the world. It means you have internet access, you are literate, and well, you know me, either for real or at the very least, through somebody who knows me or of me. Lucky you. I am very fortunate because I have a family, who like everyone's, is totally screwed up, but unlike everyone's, totally means well and loves me. For that, I am very grateful.

I am staying with my sister who is 7 months pregnant. It's pretty amazing to see the girl I grew up with, only 14 months older than I am, carrying around a tiny human being inside her. It completely blows away all of the large annoyances and minor irritations in my life, because in comparison to that one small person growing inside her, it is all infinitesimal. My sister and her wonderful, loving, fabulous husband, whom I would like to clone for all of the single women in the world who claim that there are no good men to be found, had a difficult time conceiving this baby, and they may be the most deserving parents-to-be, ever. Of course, I am totally biased, but I'm still right. I plan on being the completely annoying, overly bragging aunt, and if you hate baby pictures, you better forget about this page come February. If you think that you cannot tell a baby's genius by the way she drools or hiccups, you might also want to forget about it, because I'm sure I'll be predicting future nobel prize winnings based on those facts alone. So until then, enough about the baby. I will leave you with a little Christmas do-gooder stuff.

Today, we volunteered at the place my mom works, because they were hosting a Christmas lunch for some kids who are not as fortunate as we are. They are kids with problems bigger than the average angst-filled teen. Some have parents who are locked up for violent crime and have no other family to raise them. Some have developmental and/or emotional distress issues, and have been moved from foster home to foster home in search of a family who can cope. Runaways and kids who have been abandoned. I knew nothing about this organization before today, but I'm sure there are scores more out there across the country. I know it's easy to focus on helping the needy when we have a terrible disaster, like Hurricane Katrina, and I'm glad we all finally get off our asses when something like that happens. But the other 364 days of the year that you don't go to the Red Cross with a donation for that cause, perhaps you can consider a few hours to help an organization like this, even if it's only a couple of times a year. These people don't necessarily need your money, but a couple of hours can buy you a smile from a kid who was hungry and unhappy just 10 minutes before he set eyes on you, even if there's no tax deduction.