Day 2 of 24

On the first day of giving I gave my sister an early birthday present. She had a hand me down iPhone 4 that was super slow so my mom and I went in together on getting her a new iPhone 5s. She gives so much every day as a teacher that being able to do something extra special for her was a great way to start this giving project. And because we purchased the phone on December 1st a portion of the purchase went to the Global fund to fight AIDS.

The second day of giving is kind of a funny story. It happened today at the airport in Phoenix on our way back to Chicago after visiting family for Thanksgiving. Ebert and I were bringing back a bottle of locally brewed Arizona beer and a bottle of wine. We normally don't check bags but since we were carrying liquids we knew we had to, but the one thing we forgot about was the fee for checking bags. When we got to the airport we were shocked with how expensive it is. The line was ridiculously long and the fee was way more than what the beer cost (the wine was a gift) so we decided to leave both bottles behind. There weren't a lot of people not flying but we finally found a guy who was dropping someone off and gave him the bottles. He was thrilled about the unexpected gift and wished us a "Merry Christmas" several times. It wasn't the type of gift I was expecting to give and, at first, I had to get over my disappointment of not bringing those bottles back with us, but if that guy is enjoying that beer and wine tonight, and has a great story to tell, then that makes me happy.

This second day taught me an important lesson about getting over myself and to just give. If I had spent too much time focusing on the money lost or the fact that I won't be able to give that beer to the person I was planning to give it to then I would have missed out on a wonderful moment to give. It's exactly what I was talking about yesterday.

I'll also let you in on a little secret…another reason why I want to give more, especially during this time of year, is that as I get older I don't always feel the magic of the season. Maybe that's the curse of growing up- the magic gets lost along the way. I'm hoping to find that magical feeling again.

{image via create.your.happy}