From Roxanne's archives- written Christmas 2008
"Blood and chocolate don't mix very well."
Anyone care to guess the context in which this sentence was spoken to me by my eleven year old daughter on Christmas Eve?
I certainly had no idea when I heard her voice behind me in the kitchen. As I turned toward her, my mind spun off briefly wondering if she had been reading a forbidden vampire book.
Then she opened her mouth for me and showed me that in spite of just losing a molar unexpectedly, she was still trying to enjoy her Christmas candy. (Okay, all you non- parents reading this can go throw up and come back to our world when you are done. Feel better? Good.) She wasn't upset at all, or asking me to fix anything, just stating something she was experiencing.
I did notice however, that she kept eating the chocolate. We went on with our day, but her statement stuck with me, as did her behavior.
Blood generally signals some kind of pain or injury. Chocolate on the other hand, is the elixir of life, and works great as a metaphor for all that is good. (If you don't understand this I'm sorry for you.) Most of us generally do not enjoy mixing pain with our good times, nor do we plan on it. Yet life happens. Have you ever experienced a perfect holiday? One in which nothing went wrong? No one was sick, or late, or upset with anyone else, all the food turned out great and was ready on time and everyone got what they wanted for Christmas, and no one got stuck in bad weather? Or walked out on you? Or died?
Didn't think so. Me either. This year our gingerbread house wouldn't stay up, and (much worse) I yelled at my son on the way to the Christmas Eve service last night over something that doesn't matter now.
You could say, we got a little blood in the chocolate. It didn't taste very good at the moment. But we kept eating the chocolate, and things got better pretty quickly.
See, once you have had a life threatening hemorrhage issue, like a death or divorce or a battle with cancer, it can help you to put the smaller crises in perspective. There have been holidays in this family in the not too distant past that there was so much blood you couldn't find the chocolate.
But, I'm happy to report that this year was pretty sweet, apart from the aforementioned uncooperative gingerbread house and mom freaking out episode.
Because these days as long as no one is bleeding to death, I'm not going to let a little blood stop me from enjoying my chocolate.
I suggest you do the same. Merry Christmas.
(BTW, slightly off topic, Cassandra got a microscope for Christmas, and her favorite slide was-you guessed it- the blood.)
"Blood and chocolate don't mix very well."
Anyone care to guess the context in which this sentence was spoken to me by my eleven year old daughter on Christmas Eve?
I certainly had no idea when I heard her voice behind me in the kitchen. As I turned toward her, my mind spun off briefly wondering if she had been reading a forbidden vampire book.
Then she opened her mouth for me and showed me that in spite of just losing a molar unexpectedly, she was still trying to enjoy her Christmas candy. (Okay, all you non- parents reading this can go throw up and come back to our world when you are done. Feel better? Good.) She wasn't upset at all, or asking me to fix anything, just stating something she was experiencing.
I did notice however, that she kept eating the chocolate. We went on with our day, but her statement stuck with me, as did her behavior.
Blood generally signals some kind of pain or injury. Chocolate on the other hand, is the elixir of life, and works great as a metaphor for all that is good. (If you don't understand this I'm sorry for you.) Most of us generally do not enjoy mixing pain with our good times, nor do we plan on it. Yet life happens. Have you ever experienced a perfect holiday? One in which nothing went wrong? No one was sick, or late, or upset with anyone else, all the food turned out great and was ready on time and everyone got what they wanted for Christmas, and no one got stuck in bad weather? Or walked out on you? Or died?
Didn't think so. Me either. This year our gingerbread house wouldn't stay up, and (much worse) I yelled at my son on the way to the Christmas Eve service last night over something that doesn't matter now.
You could say, we got a little blood in the chocolate. It didn't taste very good at the moment. But we kept eating the chocolate, and things got better pretty quickly.
See, once you have had a life threatening hemorrhage issue, like a death or divorce or a battle with cancer, it can help you to put the smaller crises in perspective. There have been holidays in this family in the not too distant past that there was so much blood you couldn't find the chocolate.
But, I'm happy to report that this year was pretty sweet, apart from the aforementioned uncooperative gingerbread house and mom freaking out episode.
Because these days as long as no one is bleeding to death, I'm not going to let a little blood stop me from enjoying my chocolate.
I suggest you do the same. Merry Christmas.
(BTW, slightly off topic, Cassandra got a microscope for Christmas, and her favorite slide was-you guessed it- the blood.)
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