photo by Carol Faulkner
Usually, here at Straight from the Horse’s Heart, on Christmas Day I tend to wax a bit sappy and look back at Christmas’ past and emotional moments that bear meaning and substance.
Hence, over the past 10 years I have leaned on my Christmas’ spent in China where myself and friends attempted to reach out to the children and make a difference and in the end, the difference was made upon ourselves, forever.
Our last endeavor was 5 years ago, today, and it has pained me that I have been so preoccupied with worldly things that I have not done anything that really amounts to much, since then.
With that in mind, I told Terry, my wife of almost a quarter of century, that this year I would do something different, that I would try to reach out and do something personal this year. With COVID lurking a lot of people are hurting, perhaps no job, maybe the loss of family or friend, the entire world is turned upside down and loneness runs amok.
Posted on NextDoor by Terry: Santa Spotted! In these times, with COVID-19, my husband decided to try to spread a little joy today. If you are out and about, he has dressed up as Santa and waving to all. He’s at the south entrance of Wildwood Estates and 149. (Just north of the 149/149 Spur on 149). Happy Holidays!!!
So, the old retired Santa decorated up the old red dually, threw a chair in the back, pulled the old Santa suit out of mothballs to head up to the entrance of our Wildwood Estates and wave at passing vehicles on the Farm and Country Road come Christmas Eve. Sound weird, maybe so but I did it anyway and am most certainly glad that I did.
After only 15 minutes of standing in the back of that truck and waving at passing vehicles it felt as if almost all of the emotion was drained out of me and I didn’t think I was going to hold-up until sunset. (Being intentionally JOLLY can be quite tiring)
Virtually everyone waved, and many honked. It was my intent to make it personal that during that 2 hour period, on Christmas Eve, everyone would be smiled at and waved to by Santa as they were coming home from working, from shopping, from a friend’s house; whatever they may doing, they would get a personal wave, and in so doing they all changed me, for the better.
Everyday people, couples, single folks, kids, trucks, cars, UPS, Delivery vans, construction workers, hundreds of people smiled, laughed, honked and even stopped to take pictures with the crazy old Santa in the big red truck.
As I repeated my newfound mantra, “Work for the Honk” we became a connected community and as a community of fellow human beings we beat back despair and COVID for just a few moments and all shared a few laughs with our drive by commonality.
We all wished each other a Merry Christmas with a laugh, smile, wave of the hand and honk of the horn.
God bless you all, be thankful for whatever it is that we have, together, this day.
Merry Christmas and keep the faith.
https://rtfitchauthor.com/2011/12/25/video-a-christmas-wish-of-good-cheer-from-china/
https://rtfitchauthor.com/2015/12/28/feel-good-monday-texas-santa-visits-china/
Categories: The Force of the Horse, Uncategorized
Straight from the Horse's Heart 
One person’s very nice attempt to make this Christmas just a bit happier! Works for me>
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Every good deed (starfish) matters…
A young man is walking along the ocean and sees a beach on which thousands and thousands of starfish have washed ashore. Further along he sees an old man, walking slowly and stooping often, picking up one starfish after another and tossing each one gently into the ocean.
“Why are you throwing starfish into the ocean?” he asks.
“Because the sun is up and the tide is going out and if I don’t throw them further in they will die.”
“But, old man, don’t you realize there are miles and miles of beach and starfish all along it! You can’t possibly save them all, you can’t even save one-tenth of them. In fact, even if you work all day, your efforts won’t make any difference at all.”
The old man listened calmly and then bent down to pick up another starfish and threw it into the sea. “It made a difference to that one.”
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That was great. Need a pic.
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How wonderful for you to do that gesture.
We all need a smile and something out of the ordinary to snap us out of the confusion and gloom facing us all daily.
God bless you and your family (human and furkids) and we can only hope 2021 will be somewhat kinder to us all.
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You definitely made an impact. Thank you.
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