My other posts were kinda wordy. I’ll try to make this one short.
I’m so good at brevity, you know.

I like gratitude.
I like ham.

If I had to pick one, I’d go with the former.

You see, I had that one little day -so what if it happened to be Thanksgiving?- where I put all my happiness eggs in the “ham” basket, and it didn’t work out very well. It was a pretty miserable day, actually.

smile!

Oh, I put on a happy face at first. Laughed about it. Skyped with the family. Showed the neighbors. Ha. Ha. Ha.

And then my sweet husband put his arms around me and said,

“You’re being a good sport, but I know how much you were looking forward to this.  Come here and let me hug you.”

Well, he caught me red-handed there. I stood there and cried on his shoulder. Actually, my memory is foggy. I was too sad to cry, come to think of it. Ever been that sad? It’s not pretty.
And it didn’t wear off quickly.
Oh, no.
I spent the rest of the day in a funk.

Gloomy cloud of darkness hangin’ over my head. Mope mope mope. Pout pout pout.  Frump frump frump.

Creativity has the plague so there’s no get-together with neighbors. No rolls. No shaved-ice party. Nothing I cooked turned out well… except the instant stuffing, which only I and my sick daughter enjoyed. (Silly boys, what’s wrong with stuffing?! It’s the all-American goo of goodness! Sigh.)

The carmel-pumpkin pie turned out, technically, but just for the record, carmel-pumpkin is not PUMPKIN and didn’t taste like Thanksgiving aught to have, even if it was sugary and good.
Oh.  My apple pie turned out pretty swell, too.  I almost forgot.  (Nummy crumble topping, though the crust kinda burnt.)

I learned from it, though.

#1 – Never call your wife’s bluff when she’s trying to be optimistic.
(oh, wait – that’s on John’s list.)

#1 – I’m not as mature as I thought I was.
#2 – Gratitude is more important than ham.

And there were some nice silver linings.

We have an awesome story.

It’s going to be hard for Thanksgiving 2012 to be worse than 2011′s.  

Creativity’s plague was a one-time, half-day illness that no one else caught.  Huzzah!

Even in her not-feeling-well-ness, she made me a sweet place of honor.  She has the ability to be sweet and sensitive when she wants to.  It’s a beautiful thing.

I got to go over eat my neighbor’s pies that night, which turned out magnificent.  She even shared one of their few leftover rolls with me.  [I was right.  It was the best roll ever.]

The next morning, I was genuinely over it.  Grumpy cloud, gone!  Sense of humor, found! Thank you, Lord, for healing my hurting heart.  And thank you, Mr. Smith, for calling my bluff.

#1 – Always call your wife’s bluff so she’ll get over it quickly.

My favorite silver-lining:

It was the perfect beginning to the holiday season.

No, really, it was!  Having just experienced the crashing of sky-high expectations, I was not about to have that happen again.  No way.  We were going to have a WONDERFUL Christmas season and it would have NOTHING to do with ham.

Or anything superficial like that.

I know it’s been over for a month now, and we’re all just glad to have finally kicked “Frosty the Snowman” out of our heads for the next 10 months – but it still makes me happy to remember our first Christmas here. 

I’ve spent the last few years trying to break away from all the commercialism around the holiday season.  We’re in a new place and in a great point in our kids’ ages to start new traditions.  So help me, I thought, we are going to feel the true Spirit of Christmas this year.  Though it might be the death of me, I. am. not. going to go all crazy with perfectionism.  If my only hope for the season involves singing Christmas carols with the kids, so be it!  Low goals are easily met.

Happiness = Realistic expectations + Priorities where they should be

Somehow the Great Ham Disaster really helped me out there.  One day of misery for a whole month of joy.  It was well worth it.

And now you know

the rest of the story.

I’ve had such a fun time blogging this post-facto, I think I may continue along these lines and write about our Christmas-ing in Hawaii… Any opinions on the matter?  Interested?  D.O.N.E. with Christmas?  What say you?