Joseph J. Mazzella

It was late September. I was driving through a heavy fog to a store to pick up a few things. When I got there I strolled through the store looking for what I needed.

I grabbed a bag of dog food for my dogs, a pack of batteries for my son, and a bite of chocolate for myself. As I turned the corner to head for the checkout register, though, I saw something that stopped me in my tracks. A two foot tall skeleton wearing a tuxedo was staring across the room at a two foot tall stuffed Santa Claus, I slowly shook my head and walked on.

As I was driving home the fog lifted and the loveliness of the Autumn leaves started to shine in the sunlight. There were reds, yellows, oranges, burgundies, and browns. It was so beautiful. It was as if God had had painted each one, himself. As I watched them I realized why I had been so bothered by what I had seen in the store. It wasn’t that Halloween was a month away and Christmas was three months away. It wasn’t that the stores were doing all they could to take money from our pockets and add debt to our credit cards. It wasn’t that all of these former “holy days” had been turned into “holidays.” I had known all of these things for quite a while. It was the simple fact that we had forgotten that every day is holy. Every day is sacred. Every day is precious. We had created a world in which we regret the past, live for the future, and spend all of our wealth trying and failing to buy a few moments of joy here and there.

God doesn’t want us to live months in advance. God wants us to love, today! God wants us to share our smile, our kindness, our warmth and our joy with each other. God wants us to love each person we are with, each day of our life. God wants us to live as if each day is holy because every day is holy. Ignore the Santa’s in the stores then. Share the love in your heart instead. Make your life your gift. And give the gift of joyously to God and to everyone you meet.