We had a deal!

Oh, Punxsutawney Phil (yes, I looked up how to spell Punxsutawney)! We had a deal!

A deal that included you not seeing your shadow and calling for six more weeks of winter. After the snowy excitement and taking-my-life-into-my-own-hands to get to the airport to do my job and sliding backward down the incline at the front of my complex, I’m kind of over winter. While the snow looks beautiful from the above—like powdered sugar has cascaded all over everything or like being in an unshaken snowglobe—it’s not that great when you have to live your daily life while slogging through it. And don’t get me started on the sheet of ice, the state of my parking lot in my complex, the fact that I still can’t park on the roof lot at work because it’s a mess, and the true tale that I sort of spun my tires when trying to back out of my parking spot at my house today.

I think Snow is beautiful and glittery and enchanting and it makes me peaceful, but I’m a wee bit over him. He’s too much drama.

So, on this Groundhog Day—which reminds me of something we need to discuss. Let’s take a break from the topic at hand. Make that noise Wayne and Garth do in Wayne’s World. And don’t act like you don’t know what I’m talking about. You love that movie.

Groundhog Day? I mean, seriously? When did this tradition start? Do other countries point and laugh at the crazy Americans pulling a rodent out of a hole wearing silly hats? And I watched that moment this morning and I have to share with someone that one of Phil’s handlers kissed him. On the mouth. Have you guys ever seen a rodent’s teeth? I wouldn’t recommend kissing them at all, much less on the mouth. And Phil seemed a little nonplussed by the whole thing and a little miffed that these weirdos disrupted his long winter nap to hold him up in front of a crowd and twirl their handlebar mustaches while wearing top hats. I mean, shouldn’t Phil get to dress up for the occasion, too? A tiny little groundhog top hat maybe? But anyway, I’m digressing very far away from my point with this rambling paragraph: Groundhog Day is kind of a dumb holiday. I don’t even believe in its “findings,” yet I watch it every year. Weird, weird, weird.

So, anyway, on this Groundhog Day, let’s just celebrate the fact that we have another day and leave it at that. And my charge: find a way to live the gospel in someone else’s life today, whether it’s a kind word, buying them lunch, or being kind when your first inclination is mockery, sarcasm, and ignoring that person. (Yeah, that’s a challenge for me, too.)