Warm Fuzzies

All my life I've loved Christmas even more than the average person, but in the past few years, it has been hard for me to find the spirit of Christmas to fill my heart and give me those wonderful warm fuzzies. I can't seem to find the recipe for the warm fuzzies, no matter how hard I look. The closest I've come to feeling them is when I was watching "It's a Wonderful Life" with my family. Every year when January comes, I have that deep feeling of disappointment and unfufillment. Another Christmas has passed me by without the discovery of the WF. Not to say that I don't enjoy Christmas, it's just that I don't get that deep, gushing feeling of warmth and love that I used to cherish so much when I was younger.

Isn't it amazing how the mere aroma of something can reproduce such a strong memory? Last night I sat beside our Christmas tree, which is still up even though it's weeks after the fact, and just stared at the glowing lights for awhile. I picked up a small piece of a pine branch that had fallen to the floor and held it between my fingers. I rubbed it back and forth under my nose and just smelling that sweet pine scent made my heart flutter. I started to feel a trace of the excitement that Christmas used to bring me in my childhood. Sometimes when you can't get the real thing, it's allright to settle for the subsitute, in this case, the memory of what was. The scent of pine, the gentle glow of the Christmas lights and the company of past joys put me in such a peaceful state that I felt I could sit there for hours just staring.

It would be nice if there were more moments in life where I could just be content to sit with my happy memories. But there always seems to be that nagging voice in the back of my head: "reality check- deal with life." It's just too bad that I am such a dreamer who finds more pleasure in the past and in the future than I do in the present.