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Super Beverage
When your team isn’t playing in the Super Bowl and both teams can’t lose, it’s time for a hot cocoa toddy.
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Storm Prep
We’re expecting a decent amount of snow overnight. The weather folks have declared it a plowable storm. That’s the thing about snow around here, we often wonder if it will actually be worth plowing. If not, we just drive over it and tromp through it on our way to Dunks for an iced coffee.
As, I suspect, people who aren’t originally from these parts settle here, the threat of a little snow leads to bread and milk shortages at the market within hours of the storm’s forecast. Today was no different. I, however, was at the market to stock up on snacks for the Super Bowl. My cart bore the makings of a charcuterie platter, chocolate, and cookies. Now, I call that storm ready.
Oh, and my charcuterie serving platter is better than yours.
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From Snow to Sunbathing
This morning the temperature is 26°F and a couple inches of snow has freshened things up. In about 5 hours, the chairs, affectionately known as Addy & Ron, will be free of snow. I’ll have the option of basking in the afternoon sun in air that’s 20 degrees warmer. Folks in these parts love to tell you if you don’t like the weather, wait 15 minutes. For the record, folks in these parts exaggerate. It takes about 5 hours. Nonetheless, it’s going to be a beautiful day.
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The Sweet Silence
I’ve been under the weather for about a week. This is my second bout with a severe head cold since Christmas. I thought I had it beat, but the germs that be had other plans. The rematch has featured rabbit punches to the abdomen from coughing, occasionally ducking for cover due to fatigue, but a quick trip to the corner with my manager (my GP) let me know that my strategy is sound.
I’ve managed to stay toe to toe with this bug for many rounds and this morning I felt like it’s about to take that fateful step back that renders me the victor. Happy to be feeling better, I was detailing my progress to my husband in more detail than he likely appreciated. When I finished my assessment, he looked at me with a smirk and asked, “You know how I know you’re getting better?” I was eager to hear what signs he saw that my opponent was getting ready to throw in the towel. “How?” I asked with enthusiastic curiosity. The smirk grew, his eyes crinkled at the corners, and he replied, “Your word count is up.”
With that the referee counted to ten, the bell rang, and I was declared the winner.
When I’m completely recovered, I’ll make myself a fancy belt. It’ll be a great conversation piece.
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Drum Roll, Please
Starlight yields to sun
On the twelfth day of Christmas
The Magi march in
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Sunday Musing: The Resolution Resistance
My grandparents’ 1944 ship’s bell clock
after chiming eight bells to ring in
the new year.
The desk was also theirs.Resolution time is upon us. After the excesses of the holiday season, it feels natural to take stock and look ahead to the new year. While we’re eager to set goals for things we wish to achieve, it makes me wonder why that enthusiasm wanes so quickly. I’ve read that roughly 80% of New Year’s resolutions are abandoned by the middle of February. That makes the life expectancy of a New Year’s Eve resolution about the same as a British SOE operative behind enemy lines during WWII. You’d think that our expectations for ourselves would stand a better chance. It leads me to think that we see some of those expectations as the enemy.
With D-Day looming, how do we approach the fresh opportunity of a new year in a manner that doesn’t involve self-antagonism? The answer is simple. Don’t make resolutions. I’m serious. Life is stressful enough without lining our perceived shortcomings up against the wall to account for themselves.
That’s not to say that pursuing something new, bold, and/or wildly desired is a bad idea. I am saying that a victory-at-all-costs mentality is difficult to sustain. Our psyches yearn to look to a future without the baggage of the past. Just look at Winston Churchill who, with the war in Europe barely over, suddenly found himself unemployed.
I endorse making plans, not resolutions. Plans are forgiving, they accommodate. Resolutions feel absolute, they’re either achieved or not. So sure, sign up for that gym membership. Buy those nicotine patches. Just remember the plan is a process. If the undertaking ends up being partial or takes longer than expected, meting out self-judgement is counterproductive. Progress can be its own reward.
You may now be curious to know what my plan is for the year ahead. I plan to acknowledge my challenges, salute my triumphs, and continue to listen to my muse as I live a lower stakes life in 2025.
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Tidings of Great Joy
When I was a child, setting up the nativity was one of my favorite parts of getting ready for Christmas. I called the collection of shepherds, angels, kings, and the Holy Family “The Manger People”. My parents thought that was pretty funny. When my grandmother, Nana, came to stay on Christmas Eve, I’d bring her over to the crèche that was set up and show her where Jesus would be the next morning, stressing that he wasn’t there yet. Then I’d show her where my father and I had put the three kings. He and I would move them steadily closer until Epiphany on January 6th.
Back on December first, I began writing for Advent with the memory of Nana giving me an Advent calendar every year at Thanksgiving. It’s only right that on Christmas Day I should share another tradition that I owe to Nana. Every Christmas, I think of her as I place the infant Jesus in the crèche of the nativity set she gave me when I graduated from college.
My manger people. It was an enormous surprise, and I cherish it. When I open the boxes each year, I smile and thank her again in my heart. I gently remove the porcelain figurines and arrange them with care. The kings go to the eastern corner of the room to begin their journey. Jesus goes into temporary hiding. Everyone else waits patiently for the appointed day. Including me.
For Christians, Advent is a time of anticipation and waiting. It’s a time to prepare for both the birth of Christ and His eventual return. Christmas is the Day we celebrate Jesus’ birth and God’s gift to humanity. As we open gifts this morning and prepare the feast we’ll share with friends and family I am mindful of the divine gift bestowed. I’m also grateful for a grandmother who made Christmas extra special every time she came to stay and whose presence is still felt many years after having left this earthly realm.
I wish you all a Merry Christmas and I’ll end this post as Nana would if she had written it to one of her grandkids:
“God bless, peace, love you, Nana.”
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A Muse at Advent: The Night Before Christmas
Without any further ado, open door number 24.
December 24, 2024
On the night before Christmas, just one door remains.
My muse, Thalia, and I sit wracking our brains.
For twenty-three days we've opened each door.
Do we have enough left to write just one more?
At a loss for a topic, my muse suggests
I look back on a lifetime of joy and reflect.
To feel gratitude, I don't require three ghosts
I just need to remember who matters the most.
Without family and friends, where would I be?
Their unflinching support is love's testimony.
My beloved sister and three doting brothers
are my greatest gift from my father and mother.
A husband who laughs with me every day
Without whom my humor might go astray.
My dear friends I embrace close to my heart.
Some of them new and some known from the start.
Charles Dickens plagued Scrooge to make one pointed note
That it's those near and dear upon whom we should dote.
I conclude my calendar with this message in mind:
If you can be nothing else, please choose to be kind.
May God bless us, every one.
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A Muse at Advent: December 23
Have you ever woken up laughing? I have more often than is probably considered normal. I guess Thalia doesn’t sleep and gets bored.
My childhood and adulthood meet behind door number 23.
December 23, 2024
I had a dream that I was being interviewed by a reporter who also happened to be a Muppet. She was a pig with a black bob haircut and wore a trench coat. I asked her if she was Miss Piggy and she said, exactly like Miss Piggy would, “No, I am not. I am Christiane Amanpork. I must go now. And you need to renew your passport.” I woke up and, appropriately, snorted.
Apparently, Thalia talks to my subconscious, too. This behind-the-scenes partnership successfully found a way to get me to follow through with the paperwork. Well played.
My passport photo also turned out pretty amusing.
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A Muse at Advent: December 22
It has to be cold for precipitation to fall from the sky as snow. A lot of people don’t like the cold and, by association, snow. Such a hasty judgement could mean that they miss out on one of the most amazing phenomena in nature.
Walk through door number 22 into the snowy woods.
December 22, 2024
I really think the woods are just as lovely in winter as in summer. They’re so white and still, as if they were asleep and dreaming pretty dreams.
– Anne Shirley, from Lucy Maud Montgomery’s novel Anne of Green Gables
I wholeheartedly agree. Winter’s beauty is sometimes hard to appreciate. After a technicolor explosion of foliage in autumn, its simpler palette can feel a little dull. The trees may no longer have their leaves, but the contrast between their bark and the winter sky is beautiful. There’s nothing to distract the eye from their graceful form.
The woods out back. A blanket of snow muffles footsteps, bird calls, and nearby traffic noise, allowing, as Anne Shirley said, the trees to sleep peacefully until spring. But it also ensures there are no secrets in the woods. Nests become visible. Weak sunlight reflects, unfiltered, into the depths of the woods. Predators lose their cover, yet prey leave visible trails. Mother Nature manages to keep things in monochromatic balance.
If you live someplace prone to snow, take a walk after the next snowfall. You don’t have to walk through the woods to appreciate the hush that falls after it snows. City streets and beaches take on an otherworldly quality, too. I even wonder if there’s more to it than snow’s insulating properties. Perhaps the peaceful aura snow produces allows us to reveal the secrets we keep from ourselves; footprints through the snow that lead us to our souls.
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