Let's hope it's a good one, without any fear.

Wow, I have officially become terrible at communication. First things first: Happy Christmas! I know it's the day after... but to my mind, Christmas continues as long as I can sit here, look to my left, and see our off-kilter Christmas tree with it's multicolored twinkle lights.

I'm trying to think of what's been happening in the past two weeks, but it's rather difficult to sum up. AH! Though you should know that I PASSED MY MATH CLASS. Words (still) cannot express how happy this makes me. The realization that I'll never have to do math again, that I almost quit 3/4 of the way through but decided to attempt beating the odds, and that I'll NEVER HAVE TO DO MATH AGAIN (again), hits me at random intervals and makes me ridiculously giddy. A friend of mine was praying for my test, the day before it, and she made a comment to the effect of, "Even though these things don't really matter in the long run, to us it seems like the end of the world..." I've been realizing how true that is of most things. It would have sucked if I had to retake math next semester, but even then, I realized, it would have been over at some point - and then life would go on. Ten years from now I wouldn't really care either way. I mean, obviously I'm happy that that wasn't the case... but the point still stands: It wouldn't have been ideal, but it would have been alright. In any case, it would have been God's plan - and I'm beginning to realize that there's not much I can do about that. A little frustrating for us control-freaks, but in the end, incredibly comforting.

I really ought to be packing for Truckee (tomorrow!), or organizing my Christmas booty, or something useful. But I thought it best to check in and say what ho and all that, seeing as how I've been incredibly lazy about writing here. Not so much lazy - I just haven't had a second to spare. Finals were insane, and then I had like a week to prepare for Christmas - which was really difficult considering the fact that I was gone somewhere or another every stinking day. I was gone doing happy things for the most part, though, so I can't complain. In any case, the presents all got done somehow. You can always tell when the economy (national or familial) is bad when almost all the presents under the tree are home-made. But that lends a nice authenticity to it all, doesn't it?

We had a very low-key Christmas; not so low-key as last year, perhaps, but that's mostly because last year's Christmas didn't really exist. That was the first year that we didn't have an open house on Christmas day, like we've had every other Christmas that I can remember; we didn't have an open house yesterday, either. I guess everybody found a place to go for Christmas. Anyway. After our morning festivities were concluded here, we trooped over to Ami and Papa's and stayed there for the remainder of the day, seeing as how we haven't really been able to get Ami to come over here. As I said, very low key... just family, ham, mulled wine and (of course) coffee. At some point during the evening Kate pulled out her ukulele, and Jon pulled out his 12-string, so I grabbed my Takamine and somehow, Happy Christmas (War is Over) started. It wasn't perfect, seeing as how it was the first time we'd all three played together, but we had everybody singing with us and doing the over-lapping harmony thing at the end, and it was just one of those surreal moments that you see in classic movies. It was lovely.

Speaking of classic movies, we came home after and watched It's a Wonderful Life. At least, Jon, Kate and I did. I forget how amazing that movie is sometimes, maybe because I get so distracted with running around yelling, "MERRY CHRISTMAS, MOVIE HOUSE!" whenever I think of it. Also, maybe I've just gotten incredibly emotional in the past year... I never used to cry during movies. The whole last scene of the film had me in tears. I think when I was little I missed the entire point of the movie; but last night it suddenly hit me how much it related to my way of thinking, and Jon's, and Kate's... and then I realized that that's why the movie is so popular. Everyone is so desperate these days, for one thing or another - but no man is a failure who has friends. We all need to hear that once in a while.

Anyway, I ought to go pack. I'm so glad we're going away for a while - partly because I just want to sit with a blanket and read for hours on end, but also because everybody in this family severely needs to sleep for about 24 hours straight. I'll be back in a week or thereabouts, which means that this is the last post in the little section marked "2010". Which I'm a little upset about as I just got used to writing the year correctly. Oh well. This time next year, I'll be writing "2011" like a pro. Until January, however,

A very merry Christmas,
and a Happy New Year.
Let's hope it's a good one,
without any fear.

War is over, if you want it.
War is over
Now.