Caroling to the Alpaca Lady--Who Works with Suicide Prevention

Christmas can be the happiest season of the year--or the saddest.

Hundreds of people, especially familes with children, lined the streets in Calhan during the Calhan Christmas parade a couple weeks ago. Tired of the lockdowns and mandates and masks, they stood out in the fresh air, spread out along one town block after another, waiting for the next lit up float.  Our friends drove a tractor and wagon with lights and Christmas music,  inviting me to jump on when they passed Jonathan, Danny, and me watching on the sidewalk.

I jumped on!

We waved to people and told them all, "Merry Christmas!"

'Cause in hometown Calhan you can do that without getting into trouble. 

And Rose followed right behind on her horse, complete with battery-run, multi-colored lights and a band of bells. Her horse did a super job of not getting spooked but letting people pet her. 

Kids loved that horse. 

Rose rode that same horse last night when we went caroling with two sets of friends--a home school family, and a couple from church who had first had supper with us. 

Borsch and cornmeal muffins.

And then we went caroling in the cool dark--getting our boots powdery with dust instead of snow since it's been so dry lately.

Not everyone is blessed to be as happy as we this Christmas. Some have lost a wife, a son, a spouse, a sibling, or have this year gone through a bitter divorce. 

Some are thinking of ending it all.

When we arrived at a neighbor down on the next circle to carol to her, she was just parking her pickup near the barn, getting ready to unload hay and feed for her alpacas. 

Those bales of hay were heavy, as were the feed sacks, and so was her heart, we found out afterward.

There we were, piling out of our vehicles and starting to sing "Away in a Manger" near that barn with all its mangers.

And then "The First Noel."

And the lady stood in the dark, asking us to please sing another one.

So we sang, "O Little Town of Bethlehem," and we watched the lady sing with us under her knitted cap, under the starry sky. 

Our boys and the other boys jumped onto the back of her truck and promptly unloaded those bales of hay. They took in the feed sacks as well, probably the funnest part of their evening!

And then we heard what was on the "alpaca lady's" heart.

She works on a Suicide Prevention Phone line for the Veterans Administration, and last night she had a really tough call. She was dreading being on call again tonight.

Christmas time is really bad for many vets, and some just want to end it all. 

"I was dreading this night," the alpaca lady told us. "And then you came and sang, and my whole evening changed."

We pray some wounded, worn out, and weary vet's evening and Christmas will also be changed. 

Beside their weary road, may they hear the angels sing!