People talk about the fact that the holidays are a stressful time. This is mostly because people tend to travel, stay outside of their homes, deal with family and outside influences and basically take themselves out of their comfort zones. But there’s no denying that when gifts are exchanged, there’s that moment of glee and child-like wonder, even if you find yourself as an adult. What’s even more exciting is when you receive something from a family member that has some thought and appeals to your interests. this was exactly the case for me, this holiday season.
This year, I got a lovely sky blue sweater from my wife. She also gave me a lovely light-grey suit for work, which I had been eyeballing for quite some time. I got chocolates and a few assorted little items and tokens but I also got three very important little gems from my kids, which I was quite pleased to get. I apologize for the look on my face in the photo below. I was giving my son Nathan instructions on how to take a photo of me, holding my prized Christmas presents. He snapped the photo while I was explaining, hence the serious face. I would have had him retake it, and I did. This was the best one he took…
One could swear from the look on my face that I’m unimpressed but I swear I’m happy with what I got. What you’re looking at are special editions of the Art of War by Sun Tzu, the Art of the Samurai by Yamamoto Hagakure and Tao Te Ching by Laozi. I’ve owned all three books in some iteration or another, at some point in my life. In fact, I think I still have an older copy of the Art of War somewhere in all my stuff. But these special editions have not only made an excellent gift that’s right up my alley, it’s reignited my interest in all three books and will occupy what little bit of reading time I have, over the months to come. ☯️
The Blogging Buddhist 
Score. 🙂 All 3 have been in my library for years.
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