The Week Between

The days after Christmas always feel a bit like a let-down. The presents have been opened, people who gathered are dispersing, and what lies ahead is just clean-up and normalcy, with a quick New Year's Day celebration. It also usually means that vacation is quickly scurrying to an end. However, this year vacation is just beginning for me! I have been enjoying my time off so far, getting my grading done and doing some relaxing and shopping with Steph. She left yesterday, though, so I'm a little sad and lonely, but I'm doing some projects around the house and cleaning. I also discovered Ceragem, which is a massage bed store. I met the owner at our church's Christmas party and her name is Kathleen. She owns the place and said that people come in daily for free treatments on the beds. I asked if she felt used that people come in every day but don't pay her anything. She said that they eventually buy the bed or tell other people about, and it all works out in the end. So I finally found the place in Fort Myers (when you come visit I'll take you there!) and went for a treatment yesterday. It's not like a traditional kneading massage, but instead there are rollers that roll up and down the spine s-l-o-w-l-y, realigning everything and giving a wonderful stretch. There's also infrared heat involved which is supposed to help detoxify the body. I haven't done enough research to figure out if I buy that yet, but it felt fantastic. I'm going back tomorrow. Find a place near you-- www.ceragem.com .

Today I hung out with a teacher friend of mine who is getting married in February. Six of us had lunch together and then worked on wedding favors, hot-gluing feathers to Mardi Gras masks. Tomorrow will be a Ceragem treatment and then learning how to use my new sewing machine. My old Singer died just before Christmas and I bought a new White one which I can't wait to learn how to use.

Well, I owe you some pictures. Here are our adventures this past week. I hope your Christmas was warm and wonderful. Each year I yearn for a newness of the Christmas message to come, something besides the straight facts of Luke 2. Our sermon on Christmas Eve was about how Jesus came not just to save us for eternity's sake, but to make us *whole*. That word "whole" hit me and stuck, as I have been feeling anything but whole lately with this job taking everything out of me. I intend to spend my vacation time pondering that thought and figuring out what wholeness means. If you have thoughts, I'm all ears.

Anyway, here are pictures.