Thoughts on the Eve of Christmas Break

December 22, 2024, I'm so relaxed listening to this piano jazz music all afternoon and evening, my body says it's time for bed, but I haven't written anything today, and I feel I'm supposed to do that. I restarted this blog Nov. 19 and have written in it every day, so I now have written the equivalent of about half a book in just over a month. Now if I only knew what to write a book about I would get started on that. I think I started this in 2015 intending to write once a week, but appear to have quit in 2018, and then started it up again this year (2024), In between, I think I had some trouble getting back on this one and started another one with WordPress in 2019 or so, but slacked off on that one and it threw me off, so when I couldn't get back on that one, I somehow managed to get back onto this one. I think I was writing in the second one about once a month, until I let it go. The WordPress account wouldn't let me back on unless I changed my password, it kept telling me the password was incorrect, but it was not because it worked on my phone, but I have no intention of blogging on my phone. A laptop is the closest thing to a typewriter. I am pretty vexxed at WordPress for doing this. They told me in an email to change my password, but I don't want to change my password. I hate changing my password, especially when the one I was using was not incorrect. I'm not the craziest about all this password nonsense nowadays. I don't feel like changing the picture either. It's one I think I had taken when I was working as a staff writer for the Osage County Herald-Chronicle in 2006. I realize that that was a while ago, but keeping the picture reminds me that time is flying, right? Well, it is. And what has changed? Have I changed? I believe that by faith, but I am not sure I know how to describe in what way. Hopefully, more mature in Christ, hopefully, less worldly, less carnal, less "flighty," although I have to say I still have a heck of a time holding still very much. I'm beginning to think about New Year's Resolutions now, though I haven't made them for three or four years. It seems so useless. The whole endeavor seems more like an exercise in futility than anything else. I know I haven't lived up to the ones I wrote in about 2021. Not even sure where I put them. More and more layers of the onion of not-having-my-ducks-in-a-row. If a person gives up on having their ducks in a row, is there really any reason for New Year's Resolutions? It is so quiet now. Everyone in the building has probably already gone to bed. Since I've lived in this apartment, I bet I've gone through at least six upstairs neighbors. The first threw up out the window. One group broke the glass on their sliding doors and they shattered all over my patio. One couple who lived upstairs fought all the time and one guy was wheeled out on a stretcher. The guy who lived up there before the current occupant always cooked something awful with chicken in it all the time. The guy that's up there now, I think he's a pretty good cook. Some of his cooking smells really good--so good, in fact, every time he's cooking something up there that smells delicious, I fantasize about walking up there and knocking on his door and inviting myself in for dinner. Yeah, right. The good cook is also pretty quiet. I really appreciate that. He just comes home from work and walks around kind of heavy for a few minutes and then it's quiet. I think he's either already gone in the morning when I go to work, or he's still asleep. Anyway, I hope he stays for awhile. Every time somebody leaves I pray real hard for somebody quiet to move in up there. He's been a dream neighbor. Having lived in 10 states, you know I've had some doozies for neighbors. The Knoxville neighbors were the worst. This was one time when I was renting a house. The next door neighbors always played music real loud and the man of the house would go sit in his car and drink beer and stick his feet out the car window. Somewhere I think I may still have the picture I took of that. His poor wife must have thrown him out there, I suspect. There was also a drive-by shooting at that location and one of the sons got killed. That was real sad too because he was the sweetest one. If I every asked him to turn down the music, he would do it. One time he even walked me home to my house. Turns out the youngest kid was walking around in the front yard on his phone talking trash with some other kid I guess, who decided to drive by and shoot up the house. There were two people in the car, and I think the driver was 21, and the other one was just a kid. I don't remember the details, but I came home from going home for Christmas or something and this happened the same day. Crazy, crazy, crazy. You see, where I live now, in an apartment complex, people move in and move out all the time. I don't know where they go. Sometimes they buy a house, sometimes they find cheaper rent somewhere. I've been here for 16 years. That's a long time. It's the eve of the first day of Christmas break aka "Winter Break." I want to say let's just call it "Give me a break." Why should we have to call it that? It's Christmas break. It's been Christmas break my entire life, and it will always be Christmas break. As long as I work in a school and as long as I can keep working in a school, it will be Christmas break. Or Christmas vacation. I am okay with getting older. A friend of mine on Facebook I don't know in person turned 60 today and is being blown away. Another one said, "Wait till you turn 70." I didn't put my two cents in. We're all going to get older and/or we're going to die, there really are no other alternatives. I commented, "You get used to it." She laughed. I think Reba McEntire and Dolly Parton are both lying about having memory loss in a commercial about some product that supposedly helps with that. At least I think Dolly's lying because she is saying the exact words that Reba was saying, so I know the silly thing was scripted, and it is just as likely that neither one of them is suffering from memory loss. Things like that blow my mind. How could they be telling the truth if they are both following an identical script? I can't believe both of these women need the money to do this commercial--can you? Anyway, I don't pay attention to commercials. I just mute them. Reading and blogging has helped me reduce my screen time, for which I am very grateful. I have too many books around this place to take up all my free time looking at stuff on my phone. Sometimes I wish I would have never got the smartphone, I did all right with the flip phone until 2020,when the world turned crazy. I like my phone, I like it too much, but I have to do other things besides spend endless hours on that thing. I have about cut it in half, so that's a good start. I'd really like to get it down to about two hours a day. Somebody asked me today if I was a history buff. No, I am not a history buff, I just like to read about the Civil War, World War II and about great writers like Winston Churchill and George Orwell. I like to learn about history, especially when what I'm reading about my parents' generation (the Greatest Generation) sounds so much like what's going on in our world today. The world is blowing up, and I think it is by the grace of God alone that we are not in World War III but it is too late to start a rant about that. I am trying to steer clear of that, which is one reason I'm writing. Well, I'm beginning to yawn now and rub my eyes. So what is the conclusion of what I've been writing about? I just finished the psalms and I get to start them over tomorrow now. I read them every Sunday. I love the psalms. The last three psalms are all about praising the Lord, and that is always a good idea. I am looking forward to not setting the alarm for two weeks (except for Sundays) and doing some more relaxing and reading, like I did this afternoon. It had been a long time to stay in one place like that, and I think I'll try to make a habit of it. Goodnight.