Blog #398: Closing Up on Christmas 2023
- Jeffrey Snyder
- Dec 27, 2023
- 2 min read
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As I prepare to wrap up my blogs for 2023, I can say that it has been more than a roller coaster year for myself and for “Going the Distance.” This was more evident during the month of December where so much had transpired that it was more than turbulent to say the least. Of course, this wasn’t as easy for me as a neurodivergent ranging from stresses at my day job, to flight delays before Christmas, to worrying about an upcoming appointment with my doctor.
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Now, you might be wondering why I would do a blog offering closing reflections on Christmas 2023? Well, I want to let you all know that while Christmas Day itself is over, there is still New Year’s to go through before we start fresh in 2024. But the key takeaway here is that reflecting on Christmas 2023 will help you better prepare for Christmas 2024 in terms of correcting what went wrong.
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This year, I thought of Christmas as like getting prepared for a colonoscopy with the colonoscopy being on Christmas Day itself. There was so much prep that went into making December 25th what it was and it was not easy. I’d like to think of what I went through between Thanksgiving and Christmas as like part of that colonoscopy, taking the Miralax and green Gatorade and without getting too graphic, letting the work commence.
But this didn’t go on for 24 hours, it went on for 4 weeks. Having both the holidays and everyday life fighting for control made my daily grind more difficult and as for someone with mental health, it was definitely a challenge.
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But I think the biggest challenge during this holiday season involved one of my passions…air travel. You see, every year, my folks and I travel down to Virginia to visit my sister, my brother-in-law and his folks along with my two nieces. Every time I go down, whether it’s for their birthdays or for Christmas, it’s a very overstimulating experience for me. In fact, there were moments where I almost had a sensory overload/meltdown, but I was glad that I didn’t have one because it would have been embarrassing.
Now, while I did survive the visit itself, the return flights were more than turbulent. Coming down on American Airlines wasn’t that bad, flying through Charlotte, North Carolina. But the day I came back, there was a massive windstorm and as a result, my connecting flight in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania ended up being delayed for almost 3 extra hours on top of my scheduled 2 hour layover, resulting in me getting back into Providence nearly four hours late.
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After this, I couldn’t help but ask myself whether this Christmas was more of a life challenge or just a case of circumstance. Sure, our outside world is going down the tubes, but it could have been a life challenge to make me a better individual and a better public speaker as a whole. I will say that there will be some personal and professional changes for 2024 as “Going the Distance” moves into it’s third year of operation.
Stay tuned for further developments!!
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Catch you all later!!
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