The world of a newspaper writer is sometimes odd. Due to the timing of Christmas, my deadline for this column is almost a week before Christmas. It’s kind of funny to think about what to write, as you will all be reading this after the festivities of December are over. I’m going to assume that we have had a wonderful Christmas in our family, because, really, when have we not? We may not always get everything we wanted. Someone may have ended up feeling under the weather (currently me in our family). Dinner may have burned. The tree may have fallen over. But always, Christmas is a joy and a time of warmth and love in our home, for which I am always grateful.

The interesting thing about our family is our lack of traditions. When we were kids, the holidays were very much the same each year, shared with my cousins. Each year we would swap off which house Thanksgiving and Christmas were held in. My mother or my Aunt Bev would do the cooking, depending on who was hosting. And we would all sit around the tables — an adult table and a kids’ table, of course. On Thanksgiving, we always watched the musical version of Scrooge to kick off the Christmas season. That movie, at least, is a tradition my family has continued, and my kids can sing all of the songs right along with me. But this year, I’ve not watched any Christmas movies yet, no Rankin and Bass specials like “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” or “Santa Claus Is Coming to Town.” Did you watch all of those every year like we did? Charlie Brown, Rudolph, the little drummer boy. We would all find out when they were going to be on, because you only got one chance at each of them each year. Recording and repeats just weren’t a thing back then. Now you can pretty much watch all that stuff whenever you want on On Demand or YouTube or something like that. I think there was something more magical about everyone planning their lives around the one night each special was on. But that’s maybe just me.

Do you have a New Year’s resolution? I’m not a believer in them myself. It’s just too much pressure for me. I guess if I were to do one, it’s just to try to be a better person than I was the year before. I can’t believe it’s already 2019. Weren’t we just partying like it was 1999? So no resolution for me, but I do promise to try to be more kind, understanding, and patient.

So it came to my attention tonight that one of my former students, Brenda DeOliveira, has been suffering from chronic pain for years. She’s now 20 years old, and has been battling it since she was about 7! It caught my attention because in her video she mentioned living with fibromyalgia, which I was also diagnosed with this summer. I have managed to deal with a lot of my pain and weakness with a significant change of diet and some medications. Brenda clearly suffers a much more debilitating case, and has difficulty walking for more than 20 minutes without the aid of her wheelchair. And yet she is still positive and joyful. One of my most vivid memories of her was the crazy number of cupcakes she made for Recognition Day the year she graduated from eighth grade. She pretty much made enough for everyone. She also had a crazy number of community service hours, as I recall. Students have to have 22 hours of community service to graduate, which they can obtain starting in sixth grade. By the time Brenda graduated, she had something like 185 hours, I think. Always doing for others. Now she is reaching out, hoping others can help her, which is very much against her nature. But all the doctors and medical care adds up, and so she started a GoFundMe page. If you know Brenda, or even if you don’t, and you are feeling generous, you could donate to the cause by visiting her page here: bit.ly/2Bwzk2M.

Happy birthday wishes go out to Kelly Hess, who celebrated on Dec. 23. I hope all your presents were wrapped in birthday paper, Kel. Other birthday wishes go out to Christy Edwards on Dec. 24, and Amy Sullivan on Dec. 28.

That’s all I’ve got for now. I hope you all had a wonderful holiday, and got to relax and rejoice with family and friends. New Year’s is on the horizon. If you venture out to celebrate, please be responsible and safe. Have a great week. I’ll see you next year!