It only stands to reason that in a year like no other we’ve ever known, there are those who are already showing their ‘Grinch’ but … let’s pause and revel in the “real reason for the season.” I have now reached the point I refuse to let those who mourn pull me to their depths because I chose to be happy, just as they pick the opposite. For the past 20 years, I have continually asked for the same gift – “a chance.” And in every year that has followed, I have been almost smothered in the wonderful chances that have come in my direction … a chance to heal, to forgive, to be brave, to tell a joke, to stand beside a friend, to expand my prayer list, to do a good deed -- and not get caught -- so maybe someone I love will believe in miracles too!
As our lives slow so we’ll relish the Christmas Eve calm, allow me to share some of my 11th-Hour wishes …
I WISH that we, as a nation, would fall on our knees like The Wise Men of long ago; and give our heart-felt thanks to The Babe for guiding His blessed scientists with the route to come up with a vaccine for the worse pandemic the world has ever known … in just nine months! … by my calendar.
And you don’t believe in miracles?I WISH that millions of college football fans could realize that almost every All-American pick this year earned his role because each – individually, mind you – was ready to “step up” when a teammate got hurt or was no longer available. Look at the top five Heisman Trophy finalists – not a one was great a year ago. The late Johnny Majors was as right as springtime rain when he would tell any player: “If you stay … you will play.”
I WISH I could have been sitting at the next table when Bill Murray bellowed, “It’s Christmas Eve! It’s the one night of the year when we all act a little nicer, we smile a little easier, we cheer a little more. For a couple of hours out of the whole year, we are the people that we always hoped we would be.”
I WISH my dearest friends could know that until we share our blessings at Christmas, all the snow in Alaska won’t make it white.
I WISH that all of us who voted for Donald Trump could be as confident and as excited over Joe Biden as I am. In the same spirit that I accepted Barack Obama when he was elected by the majority of the American people, in less than a month, “Good Ol’ Joe” will be MY president.
I WISH our network TV types could accept one of the key principles in all types of communication: When you use vulgar words in public, it not only weakens the message, but it also weakens the validity of the source. Far worse, some very innocent fifth-grade girl should not be exposed to such slime by an ego-driven “professional.” All she knows is that she watched it and heard it. Spare me such a dagger.
I WISH I were as clever as the sign maker outside a popular Mexican restaurant. “Soon you can put the year 2020 in the rear-view mirror because at 21 you can get a drink!”
I WISH the great columnist Dave Berry were still spinning his mischief. He once wrote, “In the old days, it was not called the Holiday Season; the Christians called it ‘Christmas’ and went to church; the Jews called it ‘Hanukkah’ and went to synagogue; the atheists went to parties and drank. People passing each other on the street would say ‘Merry Christmas!’ or ‘Happy Hanukkah!’ or (to the atheists) ‘Look out for the wall!’”
I WISH I didn’t know … this from personal experience … there is nothing so mean as giving a child something useful. One year I got a gorgeous antique desk for my room and would rather have been run over by a car.
I WISH all of us could be as blessed to know that when Carrie Underwood was a gawky teenager in a tiny town in Oklahoma, her dream was that Santa would bring her a TV for her own room. Yet when she raced into the living room, there was no big box under the tree. So, she was going to be brave, swallowing the lump that kept coming up in her throat. She was grateful for the gifts that were left for her until her last present was a small especially wrapped box. She opened it and found it was a remote control to a new TV that awaited in the garage. “It was one of the best lessons in my life,” she said, and remembers she wept as she received much more than a TV.
I WISH that the yappers who scream we must force American citizens to wear facemasks would study every citizen’s right to freedom. Our military heroes who gave their lives to defend our flag, did so to ensure our lives of happiness. While I now take every precaution, and can hardly wait to take the vaccine, I support the decision of those who will refuse the vaccine and their freedom to make that choice.
I WISH that those who have become so obsessed by COVID that they are now easy marks for quackery would get an index card, write the words found in the Bible’s book of Matthew 6:27, and carry it in their pocket every day. The verse reads: “Can any one of you by worrying add a single hour to your life?” Read it as needed.
I WISH there would be a Whitman’s Sampler under every tree.
I WISH Mickey McCamish could somehow grasp what this city feels when we pass the National Military Cemetery and see over 14,000 wreaths that lay as our soldiers sleep.
I WISH you could hear Ugur Sahin say, “What drives us is the knowledge that there are kids who want to have a normal life – there is the mother, the teacher, the old person being isolated. There is so much need.” Sahin, originally from Turkey, and fellow medical researcher Özlem Türeci of Germany, co-founded a not-for-profit biotechnology company called BioNTech in the city of Mainz, Germany (about the size of Chattanooga). They had been using a program that will “harness messenger RNA” in an attempt to fight cancer when the COVID rampage started and doing the same to the coronavirus. Funded by Pfizer, the two came up with a vaccine that is 95 percent effective and is being doled out in Chattanooga right now. Married since 2002, they will likely receive a Nobel Prize and many other honors and – what’s this? – BioNTech is suddenly worth $25 billion (with a ‘b’). Yet would you believe these two modest research scientists do not even own a car?
I WISH the longest list you make this Christmas is one that counts your blessings.
I WISH I had been at the Saturday morning breakfast table when a wife told her husband, “I had a dream last night I was at Walmart…” Her husband responded, “What a coincidence … I had a dream last night I was out with three women.” The wife paused in lifting a spoonful of oatmeal and, narrowing her eyes, wanted to know, “Was I one of them?” and then came the classic response: “Honey, you just told me you were at Walmart ….” That spoonful of oatmeal hit him right above his left eye.
I WISH we would all heed the advice of Helen Steiner Rice: “Peace on earth will come to stay, if we live like it is Christmas every day.”
Finally …
I WISH tonight, as you pause before going to bed, you’ll take stock of your family, what’s in your refrigerator, what degree your thermostat reads, those who are in the house with you, the dog, and all else in your domain, and then get down on your knees beside the bed and say just four simple words: “God, Thank you. Amen.”
* * *
Merry Christmas everybody.
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Roy Exum: My 11th Hour Wishes - The Chattanoogan
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