Too much information...

You all know about those long, long, long letters that come tucked inside Christmas cards, filled with so many family stories....  we got one of those last week, and I've been thinking about it today.

I have to say that I did indeed read every word of that single-spaced typed two-page letter. I know it was sent with good intentions, from very good friends.  I was amazed at the amount of family stuff that was packed into those two pages, and the organization of the letter was such that all of those details could only have been culled from a yearly diary.  As soon as I saw that letter peeking out from the middle of that Christmas card, my first thought was not to read a word of it.  Then as I looked at all those paragraphs, and thought of all the preparation that must have gone into it, I figured that I just had to just take the time and read it.

That letter must have been prepared by looking through a day-to-day diary... how else would you remember which of your cousins got bit by a tick, and which variety of shrubbery got eaten by the deer. And who could remember which one of the cousins had shellfish allergies?  Then there were the trips..... up north to see her relatives, down south to see his relatives, up into the mid-west to taste cheese, out west to sip wine, then to the south-east to have photos taken with Mickey and Minnie.

Then there were the birthdays (their third cousin's daughter's twins from her first marriage, her step-sons from her second marriage), the anniversaries (their sister-in-law's 25th, but it would have been the 28th if that dang husband of hers hadn't run off with the waitress at the Dairy Queen but then she left him for the car mechanic so he went back to his wife before the divorce papers were filed).

And of course we can't forget about the family medical adventures... everything from a burnt wrist from frying up the Thanksgiving turkey, to a colon exam on Black Friday which destroyed all plans to get to Best Buy for that 70-inch flat-screen.

Family picnics and BBQs, school reunions, military ceremonies, swim meets, tractor pulls, church groups, civic organizations, hand surgeries, laser treatments, ice cream socials, dog-sitting, car restorations, and let's not forget their project to build a safe-room way at the back of the house just in case another hurricane comes along.

I am worn out. Worn out to a frazzle just from reading this single-spaced typed two-page-long letter mostly about people I don't know, will never meet, and whose lives are way more busier and complex than my own quiet little life.

Worn out.  But I read it. Every blessed word of it. It was the right thing to do. If we get a Christmas card from these friends next year, maybe I won't even open up the envelope.