Belated Christmas Greetings

Since the kids left home I've not been much on Christmas cards. We used to write a family letter each year to detail the various family events, but now it seems that one year seems pretty much like the last. With kids, there were lots of things to report as they transitioned through the childhood years. After all, they were changing and growing like young weeds, and a year's time when they were six was one-sixth of their lifetime. But now there are only two of us at age 60, when one year is only about one and a half percent of a lifetime--hardly worth mentioning. So now what I do is wait to receive our Christmas cards and then send a New Year's note to those who "cared enouigh to send the very best." I dropped eighteen such missives in the mail yesterday, feeling good about having responded to those who remembered us, on the one hand, but on the other hand thinking the whole exercise is pretty superficial. Still, it keeps us in touch with old friends like the Dawsons, in hopes that we'll some day see them in person.