A “Leftover” Celebration?

May 26, 2019 by  
Filed under Humor, Stories

By Kathi Macias –

February is the shortest month in the year, and I’m okay with that. But why does it have to be the busiest too? (Okay, next to December.)

Seriously, February starts out with my hubby’s birthday on the fifth. Now, he claims that he’s too old to make a big deal of such an occasion, but I happen to know that he’d be crushed if we actually took him at his word and let it pass by unnoticed. Besides, he’s been dropping hints since November that he’d really love it if we treated him to a prime rib and lobster dinner. (Guess McD’s is out of the question, eh?) And, of course, you can’t celebrate with a dinner like that and not have a present, right? That’s a challenge in itself. He’s a golf fanatic, but I think we’ve already bought and given him every golf gadget ever created, so what’s left? Our grown children keep calling and asking me for ideas, as if I actually had any. Can anyone say “stress”?

Following on the heels of that birthday celebration comes our second son’s birthday and a granddaughter’s too. More ideas needed, though pre-teen granddaughters aren’t nearly as difficult to buy for as grown men.

We no sooner recover from that than it’s officially “hearts and flowers and chocolate” time—i.e., Valentine’s Day. Of course, I enjoy that one because I don’t just have to come up with ideas for other people; I can also count on being on the receiving end of the day too. Dinner out? Flowers? Candy? I’ll take ’em all!

After that we get a little breather until almost the end of the month when my husband and I (hopefully!) remember that it’s our wedding anniversary. Now shouldn’t that be a really special, romantic celebration? You’d think so….

Problem is, everyone’s broke from buying birthday gifts, and romance ideas are all used up on Valentine’s Day. Dinner out? Did that three times this month. Budget is blown. A quiet weekend getaway? Out of the question—same budge-related reason. Flowers? The dead ones are still drooping in the vase and shedding on the counter. Candy? Puh-leeze! I already can’t button my pants, and I still have half a box of chocolates left from Valentine’s Day!

So what were we thinking when we chose February 26 for our wedding day? Surely there’s something left to celebrate at the end of such a short, busy month…isn’t there?

When I whined about it the other day, our oldest son, whose birthday is December 22, reminded me of how many times he felt cheated having a birthday three days before Christmas. He has a list a mile long of gifts he got with the note “Happy Birthday AND Merry Christmas” on them. He’s got a point.

His mention of Christmas got my attention, too. Only two months since we celebrated the greatest gift ever given, and now I’m complaining about not getting or doing anything special on my anniversary. The more I thought/prayed about it, the more I realized how self-centered so many of our celebrations are, and I decided it was time for a change. Not sure how everyone else will react, but here’s the plan.

This year, for our anniversary, instead of going out for a dinner we don’t really need, I’m going to suggest donating that money to one of our favorite ministries and maybe even donating the time to a local outreach at our own church. If my husband and I do it together, something tells me it will be more meaningful than anything else we might have planned for ourselves. And it just might be a great idea for the next family event, where we can include children and grandchildren, siblings and their families, and work together to bless others. I have a feeling it just might catch on—and permanently do away with “leftover celebrations.” Care to join us?

Kathi Macias (www.kathimacias.com) is a popular speaker and an award-winning author of more than 30 books, including the popular Extreme Devotion fiction series from New Hope Publishers.

The Start of Something Good…or Not!

May 10, 2019 by  
Filed under Humor, Stories

By Kathi Macias –

I’ve always been one of those “half-full” kind of people (as opposed to half-empty). You know what I mean—an optimist who prefers to focus on the positive rather than the negative and who usually expects things to get better instead of worse. But sometimes that’s not an easy stance to maintain.

Let’s face it. Even we half-full people get stuck in the middle of half-empty ones much of time, don’t we? How about the recent Christmas gathering where you were chatting with a handful of attendees, telling them about how grateful you were to be feeling better lately? The half-empty pessimist responds with, “That’s what happened to my Uncle Ned right before he died.”

Thanks, buddy.

Someone else in the group tries to turn the conversation back to a cheerful note by commenting about how God has blessed him with a raise. Another Gloomy Gus pipes up with, “Some bosses do that just before they fire you.”

Really? Of course not! We know how ridiculous that reasoning is, but it’s tough to counter, isn’t it?

The one that really gets me, though, is the “life-is-awful-and-then-you-die” sage, who thinks he’s so clever and deep by tossing that tidbit into the mix. Some of the other comments I can ignore, but that’s one I just can’t let go by.

When someone throws the “and then you die” phrase at me, I smile and say, “Yes! Isn’t that wonderful? No matter how tough things might be here on earth, it will all be over in the blink of an eye, and if we know Jesus as our Savior, we get to go be with Him!”

If the person knows the Lord, that usually turns him or her back to the right focus. If not, it can open an avenue for a great discussion. What better time to watch for that sort of opportunity than at the onset of a brand new year? January is the perfect occasion for emphasizing fresh starts and promising goals. It’s the time of year when nearly everyone comes up with some sort of New Year’s resolution:

  • “I’m finally going to lose that pesky twenty pounds this year.” (Right. Anyone who goes to a gym knows the place is packed out in January—nearly empty by mid-February!)
  • “I’m going to try to patch things up with Aunt Martha so family gatherings won’t be so strained in the coming year.” (A worthy goal, indeed!)
  • “I’m going to write that book…climb that mountain…take that class…learn to paint…practice the piano…” (You get the picture.)
  • The bottom line is that we all know our life isn’t what it should/could be, and the New Year seems to offer us a chance to make it better. Sadly, few resolutions ever amount to anything more than another crushed dream or one more guilt trip to add to the already mountain-size baggage we’ve been lugging around from previous years.

    So why am I a half-full optimist rather than a half-empty pessimist? Because I’ve learned one thing in life (not much else, I’m afraid, but it’s enough!), and that’s that it isn’t about me: life, the universe, circumstances, eternity, or anything else. I didn’t make me, and I can’t change me. But I know the One who can, and He is more willing to do so than I can ever be. In Philippians 1:6 He promises to complete the “good work” He began in me, and I’m just simple enough to believe that and let Him do it.

    Won’t you join me in that half-full attitude and give the past (last year and all the years before it) to God, and then ask Him to fulfill His purpose for you in the coming year? If we do that, I can assure you that 2011 will be the best ever. The choice is up to us; the rest is up to Him. And that’s a really good place to start the New Year!

    Kathi Macias (www.kathimacias.com; http://kathieasywritermacias.blogspot.com) is an award-winning author of more than 30 books, including her latest release, Red Ink, from New Hope Publishers. Kathi and her husband, Al, live in Southern California, where the two of them spend their spare time riding Al’s Harley—hence, Kathi’s “road name” of Easy Writer.

    December Blahs and Humbug!

    May 1, 2019 by  
    Filed under Humor, Stories

    By Kathi Macias –

    No, that’s not a misprint. I meant “blahs and humbug,” not “bah, humbug,” though anyone who knows me would be shocked to hear me say either.

    I’ve always been the one to finish my Christmas shopping in July and have my 250 cards signed, sealed, and ready to deliver by Thanksgiving. The packages are wrapped and the house is decorated (inside and out!) by the end of November, and my oven goes into non-stop baking mode two weeks before the Big Day.

    Well, okay, that’s how it used to be! Now? Not so much. I think my pre-Christmas regimen began to disintegrate when the last chick left the nest, more than fifteen years ago. Little by little, I found myself cutting back. I used to take such pride in adding one more special, dated ornament to the tree each year, but with the kids all gone and decorating trees of their own, what was the point? The only recent exception was the year my husband and I spent Christmas in Hawaii and I came home with a “Mele Kelikimaka” ornament to remind me of how wonderful it is to spend December 25 on the beach, sipping fresh-squeezed pineapple juice and not giving a thought to all the emails that were piling up in my unchecked inbox at home.

    I do still put up a tree, of course, but we no longer go “over the river and through the woods” to chop one down. I simply pull it out of the box, fluff the branches out, add a few ornaments, toss some tinsel, plug it in, and voila! We’re good to go.

    I confess too that I’ve resorted to gift cards for our ever expanding family. It was easy to shop carefully and personally for each family member when we just had our boys at home, or even after the first couple of grandchildren were born. But we’re closing in on almost twenty of them now, and it’s gotten out of control—not to mention that we almost never get what they like anyway, so gift cards are the perfect solution. And with each of our children now having to alternate holidays between us and their in-laws, I don’t even have to cook the big Christmas dinner as often.

    I should be glad, right? I mean, December is so much easier now! Still, I must confess to missing that hectic flurry of activity that used to wear me out but also left me feeling so…satisfied. Fulfilled. As if I’d actually accomplished something. Can you relate?

    Sure you can. The empty nest changes things. Life is simpler, I suppose, but a bit more “blah and humbug.” Don’t you think?

    But it also gives me more time to reflect on what Christmas is all about. Family, yes. That’s such a big part of the celebration. But is it really the “reason for the season”? Of course not. And regardless of the season of life we’re in and whether or not we still have children at home, still bake Santa and tree cookies, still hang stockings, or still delight in watching our children’s eyes light up when they open their packages, we can celebrate the birth of the Savior and worship the One who sent Him to us. If we’ll stay focused on that, we won’t have to worry about “blahs” or “humbug.”

    Have a blessed Christmas, dear readers—wherever you are!

    Kathi Macias (www.kathimacias.com; http://kathieasywritermacias.blogspot.com) is an award-winning author of more than 30 books, including her two most recent releases, Valeria’s Cross from Abingdon Press and Red Ink from New Hope Publishers.

    Let’s Talk Turkey!

    April 25, 2019 by  
    Filed under Humor, Stories

    By Kathi Macias –

    It’s November, and I want to talk turkey. Trust me. I know a lot about the dirty birds. I’ve spent my life dreaming of soaring with the eagles, but…well, you get the picture. In fact, something tells me I’m not the only one who’s spent more time with turkeys than with eagles, am I right? Unfortunately, in my family, the chances of breaking out of that worm-pecking, bug-eating flock on the ground to join that majestic bunch in the sky are just about zero and none.

    Let me explain. My late father (who was never late for anything in his life!) lived by the adage that there was “a place for everything, and everything in its place”; the “early bird catches the worm”; and “if it’s worth doing at all, it’s worth doing right.” On top of that, he was German! And since I was the firstborn (and the only girl), I caught the brunt of his “how to become self-disciplined and accept responsibility” lessons. I learned them well.

    Now, as a so-called grown-up, if I don’t arrive absolutely everywhere at least fifteen minutes ahead of schedule, I think I’m late. If something goes wrong within five miles of me, it has to be my fault. If it happened beyond that five-mile limit, it was also my fault because if I’d been there, it might not have happened at all.

    You get the picture: overly responsible type-A firstborn, devastated when I receive a 98 percent score on a test because all I can see are the two I missed, volunteering for everything and striving to succeed—yet never quite making the grade in my own eyes.

    Why does that make me a turkey? It doesn’t. But it keeps me from soaring with the eagles because I’m always looking down at the ground, hunting and pecking to see if I’ve missed a bug or a worm, or if the dirt needs raking or the sidewalk needs sweeping. As a result, I miss a whole lot of the soaring that’s going on over my head.

    My two younger brothers, on the other hand, have always been just the opposite. Bob, the typical middle child, was oblivious to such things as dirt or worms or bugs because he felt no responsibility whatsoever to clean them up. After all, he already had me to do it for him! And Jerry, the baby? Puh-leeze! All he had to do was whimper, and we all came to his rescue!

    Most people think firstborns are the ones who come out on top—the eagles, so to speak. Shows how much they know! Reminds me of the cartoon of the man walking his dog. The canine is having a great time, while the owner walks obediently beside him, carrying a scooper and a little plastic bag. In the thought balloon for the dog it says, “And he thinks he’s in charge!”

    Firstborns are a lot like that. We think we’re in charge. We think we’re responsible. We think we’ve got it all together, but we also think it’s all our fault—everything! We can never just relax and go with the flow—which sometimes turns out to be an updraft that carries all who are willing on eagles’ wings, far above the everyday drudgery of turkey-type living. While everyone else is soaring and swooping overhead, we’re missing out because we’re still trying to clean up and fix the mess below.

    I love and appreciate all that my disciplined father taught me, traits that enabled me to be a hard worker and a respected citizen. But sometimes we turkeys need to stop trying so hard and just look up—way up!—and maybe catch a whoosh of Holy Spirit wind and let God carry us for a while. I’ve heard the view up there is something else!

    And with Thanksgiving just around the corner, I’d like a slightly different perspective than that of a turkey, wouldn’t you?

    Kathi Macias (www.kathimacias.com; http://kathieasywritermacias.blogspot.com) is an occasional radio host (www.blogtalkradio.com/communicatethevision) and award-winning author of more than 30 books, including the popular Extreme Devotion series from new Hope Publishers and Valeria’s Cross from Abingdon Press. She and her husband, Al, live in Southern California where they spend their spare time riding Al’s Harley—hence, Kathi’s “road name” of Easy Writer!

    Die Laughing Anyone?

    April 11, 2019 by  
    Filed under Humor, Stories

    By Kathi Macias –

    Seriously. This is no laughing matter! Well, okay, maybe it is—but only because I chose to make it so. I could just as easily have chosen to cry and whine and…wait, come to think of it, that’s exactly what I was doing before I decided to laugh. Let me explain.

    It started when my husband went out of town for ten days. (Figures!) The TV in our room went out, but I figured, so what? There’s one in the family room, and who needs a TV anyway? Apparently my mom does because hers went out the next day, and she was not a happy camper. It was one thing to ignore my non-working set, but quite another to ignore hers—particularly when I was about to leave for Philadelphia to teach at a writers’ conference for several days.

    I did some scrambling and found a wonderful old gentleman in the senior park where we live (“old” as in older than the rest of us who live in the park!) who graciously offered to replace Mom’s TV with an extra set from the clubhouse until we could get her a new one. I must admit I was a bit concerned when he was wrestling one set off her TV stand and lifting the other one up onto it, but he made it. What a relief! At least the main fire was put out, and the rest could smolder until I returned from the conference.

    Or so I thought. The very next day Mom and I were waiting in our car in the drive-through lane at a fast-food restaurant when my foot slipped off the brake (don’t even ask why I didn’t have the car in park!) and I rolled (very slowly, I might add!) into the car in front of me. The bump was scarcely noticeable, and I was certain there was no damage. The driver of the other car didn’t agree. Admittedly, if I’d had a magnifying glass, I might have been able to see the quarter-inch dent he claimed was in his back bumper, but I didn’t have one so I had to take his word for it. He said his people would contact my people about the damage. Wonderful.

    One more day until I flew off to Philly. What else could go wrong? I was about to find out.

    I had to call a radio station to do an interview that final morning before leaving, and as I always do before calling in, I turned off call-waiting—nothing more annoying that beeping noises when you’re on the radio! The interview went off without a hitch. Then I noticed something odd. Each time my phone rang, it cut off midway through the first ring and didn’t ring again. After it happened several times, I called the phone company and told them something was wrong and they needed to send out a technician right away. Of course, they couldn’t do that until the next day. Great. Now no one could call in, though I was able to call out.

    Midway through the afternoon my cell phone rang, and it was a friend of mine from Nashville. “I’ve been trying to call you all day,” he said, “but I keep getting some radio station in Texas.”

    Uh oh. I was beginning to suspect a connection between the phone problem and my morning radio interview. I called the station and discovered they’d been getting calls for me all day. They suggested the possibility that instead of punching *70 to turn off call-waiting before my interview I might have pushed *72, which then forwards all my incoming calls to the station.

    Sure enough, that was it! I turned off call-forwarding and called the phone company to cancel the technician and to apologize for my error. The customer service rep laughed and said, “I understand completely. I have days like that all the time. We might as well laugh about it, right?”

    Right. I mean, seriously, she was right. But I had to grab myself by the nape of the neck and shake the whining and complaining right out of me before I could get that smile to work. It wasn’t long, though, before I found myself right in the middle of the truth of Proverbs 17:22: “A merry heart does good, like medicine, but a broken spirit dries the bones.”

    We can choose a merry heart—or dry bones. It took me awhile to get there, but I opted for the merry heart, and the rest of the day went much better. (You don’t even want to know about my trip to Philly and how my five-hour flight turned into an 18-hour nightmare! But I was still laughing when I finally landed at two in the morning…!)

    Kathi Macias (www.kathimacias.com; http://kathieasywritermacias.blogspot.com) is an occasional radio host (www.blogspotradio.com/communicatethevision) and an award-winning author of more than 30 books. She and her husband, Al, live in Homeland, CA, where they spend their spare time riding Al’s Harley—hence, Kathi’s road name of “Easy Writer.”

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