Merry Christmas from Chez Shea!
Still plugging away on the book and it's coming along nicely. I don't want to give too much away, but I will simply say "Thank you, Dan Brown! You've shown me the Way!" I'll leave you to puzzle out the meaning of that. (Hint: I'm not apostatizing.)
In other news, life goes on, much as it has this past age, full of its own comings and goings, and scarcely aware of the existence of Sheas (for which I am very thankful). My wife continues to be what she has always been: a wonderful human being who is the heart of our home. My children bring me great joy (especially as the little ones vacillate between squirming with curiosity and tittering with barely kept secrets in anticipation of Christmas). My big guys are finally at the age where they appreciate my weird jokes and crack me up with theirs too, so maturity has its pleasures too. Beyond that, writers don't live epic lives so I have little happening that's not happening on my keyboard, the results of which will be yours to judge when the time comes. I have thought of an ending for my book: "And they lived happily ever after to the end of their days." But that may be overdone.
Anyhow, since he does it better than I do, I thought I would let one of my heroes extend you a little Christmas offering along with my very best wishes to you all:
The House Of Christmas
G. K. Chesterton
1. There fared a mother driven forth
Out of an inn to roam;
In the place where she was homeless
All men are at home.
The crazy stable close at hand,
With shaking timber and shifting sand,
Grew a stronger thing to abide and stand
Than the square stones of Rome.
2. For men are homesick in their homes,
And strangers under the sun,
And they lay their heads in a foreign land
Whenever the day is done.
Here we have battle and blazing eyes,
And chance and honour and high surprise,
But our homes are under miraculous skies
Where the yule tale was begun.
3. A Child in a foul stable,
Where the beasts feed and foam,
Only where He was homeless
Are you and I at home;
We have hands that fashion and heads that know,
But our hearts we lost -- how long ago! --
In a place no chart nor ship can show
Under the sky's dome.
4. This world is wild as an old wives' tale,
And strange the plain things are.
The earth is enough and the air is enough
For our wonder and our war;
But our rest is as far as the fire-drake swings
And our peace is put in impossible things
Where clashed and thundered unthinkable wings
Round an incredible star.
5. To an open house in the evening
Home shall men come,
To an older place than Eden
And a taller town than Rome.
To the end of the way of the wandering star,
To the things that cannot be and that are,
To the place where God was homeless
And all men are at home.
Merry Christmas everybody, from the Sheas! See you sometime next year!
posted by Mark at 10:58 AM
Mark Shea's Blog: So That No Thought of Mine, No Matter How Stupid, Should Ever Go Unpublished Again! 
