It's beginning to look a lot like the end

When the stress of December grabbed me with a vengeance, I took a step back and decided to enjoy the holiday in pieces, take it as it came, not put too much significance on one party or event. Not obsess about the perfect gifts. Be flexible and spontaneous. Adjust, enjoy.

The entire holiday was great -- from the ugly Christmas sweater Young Life party to the Chilean dinner Christmas day night. Along the way, some great friends showed up at my house and some unexpected treasures arrived.

As much as we want to be in charge, the best things flit in -- unorchestrated -- and dance around your living room for a short while, then venture off.

So it was with my good friend Rhonda, who arrived unexpectedly from Phoenix and brought a Rhonda party every night. Three days later she was gone, flying off to Mexico in her U.S. Airways uniform for a beachy Christmas layover.

There were bittersweet moments, rich with emotion, as I shared in the death of my good friend's daddy and agonized over the sicknesses of a teen-ager, a baby, a friend's husband.

Some of the best gifts were spontaneous, the "here-take-it" kind: A Michael Buble Christmas C.D., a vintage white geometric pendant on a green bead chain from my daughter's jewelry chest, the stunning view of Crested Butte mountain.

So here's to learning to take things as they come and lean in.

I'm ready to do it all again. Just the same but different.

The Family Research project Rachel's English teacher assigned is a mammoth effort. Despite all the groaning about essay writing, we are grateful for results like this -- Rachel's essay about her dad:

The Gift of Life

What makes someone a hero? When I am asked this question, I think of Superman. What makes him heroic? He has super strength and he can fly, but ultimately, he is loved and revered because he saves lives. My dad does not have super strength, and he can’t fly without the help of heavy machinery, but he is my hero because he saved my life.

In November of 1994, I contracted a fever that just would not go away. The fever could not be explained and, at numerous doctor visits, my mom got the same response: “It’s just a fever. It will go away soon. Don’t worry.” She did worry though, because the fever – and my crankiness – lingered. Finally, on December 29, 1994, my pediatrician did a comprehensive blood test. The results revealed that something was terribly wrong. Doctors in Laurel sent us immediately to specialists at University Medical Center in Jackson. After blood tests, a bone marrow biopsy, and finally a kidney biopsy, doctors had a name for my problem: crescentic glamerulo nephritis. In this disease, the body’s immune system attacks the kidney. Doctors were baffled because this disease is most often found in young men and old people. I was the youngest recorded patient ever to have this disease. I was going to need a transplant to get better.

Weeks of hospital recovery, minor surgeries and setbacks followed. Finally, doctors said I was ready, but we encountered another problem. I was too small. All transplant centers in the South had a weight requirement of at least 44 pounds before they would operate. That certainly posed a problem, because I weighed less than 20 pounds and, without a kidney, a person does not grow. Our nephrologist in Jackson suggested we try a teaching hospital in Minnesota, so we did.

After several months of nightly dialysis, I travelled to the University of Minnesota Medical Center for the exhaustive pre-transplant evaluation. Every doctor imaginable came into my hospital room. They would poke and prod me until they were satisfied and then another set of physicians would enter. Even dentists were sent in to look at my teeth! Finally, they said I was ready.

After the doctors in Minnesota agreed to do the transplant, they tested each of my parents to see if either was a tissue match. Thankfully, both my parents were matches! My dad immediately decided he would be the one to donate. He knew that if my mom had the surgery he would end up taking care of the both of us. “I knew I could get back on my feet quicker than your mom,” my dad told me. “I could also get back to work faster, because your mom could take care of you.” My mom agreed, and the date for the transplant was set.

On December 13, 1995, my dad and I went into surgery. Dr. John Najarean, the transplant surgeon, carried the kidney himself from my dad’s operating room into my operating room. The transplant lasted 10 hours because they had trouble fitting my dad’s large kidney into such a small body. Both patients came out of the operating room with pain, but no complications. The kidney worked perfectly, and it has continued working well for the past 15 years.

Many people praised my dad. They called his decision heroic and talked about the sacrifice he made. One of his friends even said, “I work so hard for my kids that I would be named father of the year if it wasn’t for Bob Gholson giving his darn kidney to his daughter.” When I asked my dad if he felt heroic he said, “I didn’t even think about it. There was no question. I did what I did, not because I wanted to be ‘heroic.’ My daughter, whom I love, needed me and that was it.” My dad will not admit that he is a hero, but everyone agrees he is. His weakness is not Kryptonite, and he does not change clothes in telephone booths, but Bob Gholson is my very own Superman.

Just a hiccup away from a crazy

In the end, the love you make ...

When I die -- and I'm not planning on it since I'm real busy right now -- I want a woman in charge of the funeral.

Al Neuharth and Mildred Lawrence have made me think about our traditions of burying the dead. And I found myself asking: why?

Al is the founder of USA Today and wrote about funerals in his column this week. Mildred is a founder of the Town and Country Garden Club in Laurel, and she was in her own funeral recently.

So, in thinking about the social event that finishes out my life, I have strong feelings. Maybe everybody does.

First of all, I don't expect it to be a party. Grief is cleansing and healing. Remembering can be inspiring and fulfilling. I don't want to shortchange my funeral guests.

When I go to a funeral, I want to grieve. Especially when I truly loved the aunt or grandmother or -- God forbid -- teenager in the casket.

A funeral is one of the few times we allow ourselves to hurt deeply, hold one another's hands, feel the jagged scraping in our souls.

So please, I say to my mistress of ceremonies: let them cry.

Second, I don't want people to be bored and uncomfortable. So totally ditch the funeral parlor and the long sermon. Long lines, guest books with attached pens, tiny rooms crammed with flowers. Platitudes ("she's in a better place") and euphemisms ("passed away"). Bleck!

It can be at my house -- or if I live in one of those assisted living places -- just do it at a barn or someplace relaxed.

No preaching. Just stories and prayers and praise songs.

My guests don't have to dress up either. They can if they want to. They can wear a hand-painted silk top in fuschia and golds with their straight-legged jeans for all I care. I might wear that myself.

I hope my friends will speak through their tears about the richness of life and my efforts to get it right. I hope they will share in my passions and make fun of my faults. I pray that, looking back over my life, it won't be about collecting seashells or paintings or furniture or fashion, but about walking alongside people and truly living with them.

I love how Mildred insisted on a cocktail party at the Country Club after her memorial service. So maybe we'll finish up with a great meal and a laid-back band.

The deceased is always the star of the show, so she gets her name in the paper. She gets to pick how things are done -- just like oh-so-many years ago at the wedding.

Too bad she won't be there to dance.

Potential emcees for the final social event

Won't take nothin' but a memory

I'm not one to live in the past. Heck, I don't even visit very often.

But sometimes you find yourself in the neighborhood ... and you just have to stop and pay your respects.

Like when Kate was driving through a sketchy part of Jackson and realized she was near the cemetery and her mom's grave. Getting out of the car felt too raw and jagged, so she just slowed down ... and maybe let a butterfly of a thought rest on her mind.

I took a little backwards trip recently while passing University Hospital in Jackson. That particular trip was not a butterfly memory at all, but a big, fat, pain-filled hornet. Post traumatic stress is a real thing. I had to pull over and open the car door because I thought, "Seriously? I am going to vomit."

I don't wanna dwell there. Not in that past. Forever on the bathroom floor with a cold rag on my forehead.

But the richness of old neighborhood memories -- bike riding, short cutting through friend yards, the Blue Bees club (a secret artistic society for girls) -- those are places you might want to go back to occasionally.

Places like Hattiesburg High School, where there are lots more bars and fences now -- but the fighting Tiger mascot is still attached to the bricks.

Or the now-filled-in Jaycee pool, where they would fish you out with a big hook during a terrifying swimming lesson.

Or the Teen Center, which could also be terrifying.

Back to the days of I C H (Independent Chicks of Hattiesburg) and the Debutante Association.

Be forewarned: visiting the past in person doesn't look a lot like the memory. It's all tiny now, and campy and drab, really.

But the mind can re-play it as rich and colorful and oh-so-vivid. Just like it used to be.

300 Dixie Avenue today

"The House that Built Me"

Tricia and Forrest at an ICH dance: Circa Seventh Grade

Scott and Kent senior year:

to make you sing Kenny Chesney's "I Wanna Go Back"

Get Crunk

I asked God NOT to give me a boy child. I promise I did.

I know it was wrong. I know you should be happy with whatever you get from God: good, bad, sickness, health, rich, poor.

But instead, out of my limited knowledge, I prayed for daughters. And God obliged... for a while. Then he gave me Russ.

I thought, at first, Russ might be God's punishment for my girl request.
He kind of showed up at my house one day, like a stray cat (sorry Russ). And he didn't leave.

I would come in from grocery shopping and he would be there taking phone calls, checking his email, asking me what we were having for dinner. He borrowed tennis shorts and shoes when he needed them. He ate what he wanted. He showered. He napped.

He introduced us to all kinds of crazy words and sayings that remain in our vocabulary:
"GET CRUNK!" (when you really just needed peace and quiet)
"Oh, that's nastificrocious!" (when finding some rancid leftover in the fridge)
"Hello, this is Shakiki." (when answering our house phone)

Dang, I miss that guy.

If you were assigning categories, he certainly wouldn't fit in mine. He has done numerous things I have not had the pleasure -- or the horror -- of doing. A few of the least dangerous:
eating an entire habanero pepper in exchange for $10,
climbing the water tower on 84 East,
irritating gang members in Heidelberg,
flying airplanes,
playing in the state soccer championship in a thunderstorm.

Russ has moved on, but I doubt he will ever grow up (please, no) or be far from our hearts.

Russ is on my top ten list of good people favorites and all-time best friends.
He's the kind of person you would pick to spend your birthday with or take on a trip to the mountains because he's so... much.... fun.

And Russ is the metaphor -- the living picture -- of a blessing you would miss if God only gave you what you asked for.

Congratulations, today is your day

Twenty five years ago today the Tooth Fairy, Little Mermaid, Rapunzel and Glenda the Good Witch got together to sprinkle a little fairy dust down on the delivery suite of South Central Regional Hospital.

There, not one, but TWO unsuspecting moms were laboring away, unaware of the floating enchantment. So the magical mavens doubled their potent gifts, bestowing them on both of the newborns.

Ariel and Glenda bestowed the gift of song and an inordinate love of dressing up,

dressing down

and dressing in costume.

Rapunzel threw in a bucket of tears for frequent use as well as a strong desire for escape.

The Tooth Fairy contributed her love for adventure and traipsing around late at night.

Thank goodness there were some hefty guardian angels assigned to supervise the results.

Both new moms named their little fairy princesses for strong women in their families to give them courage to face the days ahead.

Days of Disneyworld and disco nights

of crushing heartbreaks and captivating romance

of drama and music

of pain and sickness

of super accomplishments and sad discouragements

and, all the while,

love, love, love, love, love.

As you celebrate 25 years ladies, blow lots of fairy dust kisses around.

We can all use a little magic.

Sara-Claire Lightsey

Mary Katherine McKelroy

Born October 8, 1985