::Time for my Christmas letter, a format of communication that I’ve had mixed feelings about in years past. (Read earlier letters here and here.)::

On my bookshelf are three small glass bottles, filled with sand. Sand from the beach in Nicaragua. Sand from a beach in Oregon. Sand from a beach in Florida. Sand from places I’ve traveled two, with a shell or feather from the beach tucked inside.

This year is almost over.

It was as if, for all of these many years past, I’d been busy building things out of sand. Foundations for things I eventually wanted. Dreams and daydreams. Hopes. Goals. Passing the time by thinking of what time might bring. Nothing out of the ordinary that most people don’t want, and not even bad things.

I don’t know if I wanted the wrong things or if I just don’t understand what the phrase “Thy will be done” means, but in 2009 the tide came in and everything was washed away. Wanting anything, now, is impossible. Wanting is easy; believing is difficult. It is easier to try to want nothing, veering into numb.

There may be a lesson on the wise man and foolish man, but I wasn’t trying to build a house.

The Christmas letters arrive and are filled with photos of family and friends and achievements and I’m quite happy for them before setting them aside and wondering when the tide will go out so I can have a turn, not sure I want to bother anymore, and wondering why I never noticed the water all around the place I chose to build.

Watery sand is hard to hold on to; I suppose I ought to let go. 2009 will soon be washed away, if I’m able to let it.

There were many beautiful moments in 2009. I will try to hang onto them somehow, as if in a little glass bottle so that I can remember them, they a kind of Ebenezer stone of when help sneaked through. A stone not yet worn down to sand from the constant pounding of life.

I hope your Christmas brings you peace that lasts and joy that surpasses, and that if the tide finds you, you have someone help you keep your footing and not be washed away. I hope for a different letter next year.