Friday, December 26, 2008

Christmas!

Christmas this year was very different from years past, many 'firsts' (possibly to become traditions)...

December 24 I cooked my first ever turkey and all 5 of us that ate it survived (always a good thing), and now I have leftovers for a really long time. I also just finished making some of it into a very delicious soup. mmm.

December 25 I had the privilege of volunteering at Wesley Urban Ministries (Wesley) for Christmas 'dinner' (read:  lunch). When I walk  into Wesley it's like walking into another world, a world I am both honoured and slightly anxious to be part of. Wesley is considered to be the shelter in Hamilton that serves the roughest of clientele (which conveniently I found out AFTER I became a volunteer, ... life's funny that way). For the most part the people that come to Wesley are people who have had a rough go of life, for whatever reason-usually though, the culprit is poverty. I'm realizing how true the cycle of poverty is, and how incredibly (and wrongfully) difficult it is to break.

After serving Christmas dinner I went to Shannon's parents house in Caledonia for another turkey dinner, mmm! It was great to hang out with the Higson's (sadly without a Meagan, though), playing many games, relaxing and enjoying each other's company. I think a few more attempts to teach me Euchre by Shannon or the Ross', I might actually catch on :)

Christmas will continue tomorrow at Laura's (the co-worker) for their 'lost souls' Christmas-a place for those of us who don't really have a place. It sounds depressing, but it should be good, or at the very least, an interesting time. Laura is about the furthest from a believer one can get (she grew up in the church and has rejected it) and she's a feminist. I love Jesus and I'm definitely not a feminist-not in the 'typical' sense of the word anyways. I believe in women's equal rights, but I still believe that the man is to be the head of the house and, as unpopular as it is to believe in Ephesians 5:22-33, I do.

Then there's still the issue of doing a Christmas party with church friends-which should have been organized by now, but hasn't been *sigh*.

Many much Christmas happenings. Oh right, and the fact that I haven't finished sending, heck, I haven't even finished WRITING all my Christmas cards.

I have a really random story to share. Please, take a seat...

About a year ago a guy (Branco) I went to school with at Mohawk randomly added a girl (Michelle) on Facebook (we still don't know why). A couple days later I received a facebook message from Michelle saying:

"Hey you don't me but I found you when Branco M found me and I just have to say that I have never heard about anyone with so many similarlities as I have, I was checking out your proflie, your Christianity caught my attention!!!!....... I just think that's AWESOME!!! newsboys rock and I one of favorite movies is a walk to remeber!!!"

So for a couple of months Michelle and I messaged back and forth until it eventually petered out and over the last year I've looked at my growing list of 'friends' on facebook thinking I needed to cut it down and for whatever reason I just kept Michelle on my list, although I didn't know her AT ALL and we hadn't talked in a really long time...

Yesterday at Wesley Centre a girl about my age was leaned over a garbage can scraping leftovers and she leaned back and said "hey do you go to Mohawk?" I said "well, uh, I did, but I've graduated" and she says "and you go to Church on the Rock, right?" and almost instantaneously we both exclaim "NIKI!" "MICHELLE!" and we burst into a fit of giggles when we realize that we've been serving dinner together not realizing that a year ago we had met on facebook through really odd circumstances.

My life is ridiculously weird. But I wouldn't have it any other way!

2 comments:

  1. Life can be quirky. That's so neat! I saw you in the newspaper photo about the shelter! Don't feel too bad about not yet having organized another Christmas party, with church friends. This time of year is just crazy busy and it can get too much for a lot of people. We had 2 invitations for today and didn't go to either.

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  2. you're right - your life is ridiculously weird. I'm a little jealous. Glad Christmas was good for ya.

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