Merry Christmas from Mom

Date: December 16, 2024

Author: Bobbi Holmes

Mediums often tell us that when our loved ones pass on, they can send us messages from beyond, letting us know they are okay. These messages might come in the form of butterflies, feathers, pennies, birds, or even songs on the radio.

During Mom’s illness we often discussed death and what we believed happened when we moved on. It was a discussion I never had with my father during his illness and final days. Back then his impending death was the elephant in the room that we never discussed. I have much regret not broaching that topic with him.

When discussing with Mom, those signs mediums mentioned, I asked her to send me crows. Her response, “But what if I don’t know how?” I assured her that when she passed over, she would be able to figure it out.

Before I go on with my story, three things you need to know about Mom. First, she passed away on October 24, 2024. Her first name was Caroline. Her nickname amongst close family and friends, Sweet Caroline. Mom also loved Christmas, and during the last few years of her dementia, she fretted about Christmas, afraid she would not have the money to buy her grandchildren and children gifts. That was very important to her.

This afternoon Don and I drove to the post office to mail some Christmas gifts to my sister and daughter’s family. When we got home, Don walked out to the mailbox while I took the dogs outside for a minute.

Don returned from our mailbox with a small package. He said it was for me. At first, I thought it was my medication, in one of those plastic-like gray mailing bags. It wasn’t from Amazon, and I hadn’t ordered anything.

The item was shipped from some company in California. Inside was a small box with an ornament inside. No invoice. No card.

The ornament, a crow with a Santa’s hat, personalized, “Sweet Caroline.” Of course I cried.

I have no doubt Mom sent me that crow ornament. She probably whispered in someone’s ear to get it done. The three most likely helpers would be my husband, sister, or daughter. While I didn’t ask them, my sister and husband say it wasn’t them.

Why am I so convinced Mom instigated my gift? Because I know she instigated the gifts her other daughter and grandchildren will be receiving this Christmas. After Mom passed, she had a little money left in the bank account we share. I could practically hear her telling me it was almost Christmas, and she needed to buy them gifts.

The other day my sister and Elizabeth received the See’s Candy I ordered for them from Mom. My sister said both she and her husband cried when they received Mom’s Christmas gift. See’s is a big thing in our family during Christmas. Mom loved ordering it for her family and buying some for herself. When I was a child, Mom’s mother, my Grandma Hilda, didn’t have a lot of money to spend at Christmas, but each year she would buy each of her grandchildren a pound of See’s Candy. For me and my sister, it was always a pound of Bordeaux’s, our favorite.

So I am pretty sure Mom made sure I had a Christmas gift this year, since she was getting her other daughter and the grandchildren gifts.

American Oligarchs aren’t Reading the Room

Date: December 10, 2024

Author: Bobbi Holmes

Categories: Bobbi Ann Johnson Holmes

Comments: Leave a reply

I learned something after the assassination of the United Health Care CEO. For years I had been hearing about the “elites.” You know those elites, the ones in Hollywood, media, corporations, and in our government. Because of my long ago study of journalism during college, some eleven years before the abolishment of the Fairness Doctrine by the Reagan administration, I viewed journalists in high regard and saw them as a vital cog in democracy’s engine, sanctioned in the First Amendment.

While I recognized the danger of corporations gobbling up news networks and once respected publications, I didn’t necessarily view all journalists working for those organizations as elites. That all changed after witnessing the pearl clutching and moral lecturing by those in the legacy media and talk show/podcast circles.

I’m not saying I condone or advocate violence, but a journalist’s job is to report the news, and an investigative journalist should be finding out why it happened. But when the overwhelming comments left on social media regarding the murder showed no sympathy for the CEO, those journalists clutched their pearls, showed shock at the public’s response, and some went on to lecture the public to do better.

Their responses showed such a blatant disconnect with what the 99 percenters are dealing with on a daily basis. They are either clueless, willfully ignorant, or intentually gaslighting the public. This is not to advocate violence or condone murder, but I understand how people are feeling and why someone might be pushed to violence. And those at the top 1% are doing the pushing.

Imagine you have a pit bull puppy. When you go to feed the puppy you set the bowl of food down, and after a few minutes snatch it away. He eats just enough to keep growing, but he is always hungry. When you sit down to eat a hamburger or steak he smells the food and begs for some. After all it smells so good, and he is always hungry. But instead of sharing, you give him a good kick.

The puppy matures into an adult dog. He grows tired and frustrated with you always taking his food away, of taunting him with your good smelling food, and those painful kicks. So he attacks. He kills you. While the dog will undoubtably be put down, who is truly to blame for this situation?

Meanwhile, rightwing provocateur Ben Shapiro went on a rant about the evil lefties who showed no sympathy over the CEO, yet he was met with his own followers telling him this was not a left or right situation—it was about up and down.

And then we have our newly almost appointed American Oligarch team of Elon and Vivek gleefully pushing the idea of major cuts to social security, Medicare, Medicaid, and Veteran’s benefits.

Like I said in the title, those boys aren’t reading the room.

Trees and Tears

Date: December 3, 2024

Author: Bobbi Holmes

Categories: Bobbi Ann Johnson Holmes

Comments: Leave a reply

Don and I decorated our Christmas tree this morning. Our first Oregon Christmas, back in 2021, we purchased our first real tree in years. Growing up I never understood why anyone would ever buy a fake tree. Plus, I loved how a real pine tree made our house smell.

While our tree in my childhood living room was real, it was also flocked. But Mom let me have my own little green pine tree in my bedroom, where I hung strands of popcorn and added my own decorations.

When I was in high school, I remember being horrified when my then best friend, Karen Witcher, shared with me she had never had a real tree before. I somehow convinced her parents to let her buy a real tree that year, so the two of us went to downtown Lake Havasu City and I helped her buy her first non-artificial Christmas tree and together we decorated it. Years later, when she was an adult and a mother with a young child, she told me she never went back to an artificial tree.

As for me, I switched from a cut tree to an artificial tree in the 1980s a number of years after we moved to the mountain community of Wrightwood, California. While one would assume we would want a real tree being in the mountains, I switched after worrying about fires. Wrightwood is very dry, and we always had fires burning in the fireplace or woodstove. I worried about the safety of my family; plus artificial trees had improved since those tinsel trees of my youth.

Another plus with artificial trees, they are easier to decorate because you can manipulate their limbs. And I have a lot of tree ornaments. In fact, we only ended up using about a third of our tree ornaments this year.

I remember when I received my first Hallmark tree ornament. Don gave it to me for a birthday gift right before our first Christmas as a married couple. That was when I started collecting Christmas ornaments—primarily Hallmark, but not exclusively.

I mentioned we went back to a live tree after moving to Oregon. But what I didn’t tell you, I went back to an artificial tree the next Christmas, much to my son’s disapproval. Scott and SeAnne have a real tree. I’m glad for them, but for me, the artificial tree is easier to decorate—and I don’t have to rush to take it down because it dried out.

Now to the “tears” in the title in my blog post. Decorating the tree this morning involved a few tears. It’s not just because this is my first Christmas without Mom, but bringing out those ornaments stirred some sweet memories.

Those memories involved Scott and Elizabeth when we lived in Wrightwood. Each year when we would bring out the Christmas ornaments, they insisted on taking each one out of the box, inspecting and then playing with them before they went on the tree. I smile fondly at those old memories.

But it’s not just our kids growing up, but our parents moving on. I have no right to feel sad or melancholy, because I’ve spent 70 Christmases on this earth (at least in this lifetime) and most of them have been filled with family, friends, and love. While our parents, grandparents, and aunts and uncles have moved on, they have left behind some wonderful Christmas memories for me to cherish, and because of that, I sometimes shed a few tears.