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Category: holidays

Light the Lights

Light the Lights

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Every year the lights matter more. Every year I wait for them, for certain houses that I know will pull out all the stops. With them we shake our tiny fists at the darkness. With them, we remind ourselves that spring will come again.

One house I pass on the way to Metro drips with soft white icicle lights. The bevy of bulbs transform this simple two-story into a fairy cottage.  It’s the slant of the roof and the way the house is tucked into the trees that does it. I could imagine Hansel and Gretel wandering up, expecting it to be made of gingerbread and marzipan. How kind of the occupants to leave the lights on till morning so we early commuters can be enchanted too.

I wonder if people know how much their efforts gladden the souls of passers-by. In that way lights are a visual reminder of how kindness spreads — from one harried heart to another.

Winter Lite

Winter Lite

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There are winter days when birds chatter in the hedges and what sun there is feels warm on the face. Holly berries gleam, set off by the occasional flash of scarlet from a cardinal.

I think of these days as “winter lite.” There is still a texture to them. They don’t yet have the scoured look and acrid smell of January cold. Yesterday was one of these days: it started cold but finished bright and sunny. Downy woodpeckers discovered the suet block and chickadees chittered at the feeder.

We bought our Christmas tree at a lovely church lot, rather than driving an hour west of here to cut it down. It was a welcome change — carols rang out over the parking lot and eager Boy Scouts put the tree on top of our car.

Winter lite: I’ll take it.

Appreciating Advent

Appreciating Advent

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It’s the first day of December and the first Sunday of Advent, and I’ve been trying to remember the last time we had such a tidy confluence. With Christmas on a Wednesday, that means each Advent Sunday will have its due, too.

I love Advent — the medieval-sounding hymns, the plain purple vestments, the wreaths and calendars, the air of joyful expectation.  Advent is about preparation, and I love that, too, because it reminds me that there are things worth waiting for and they are all the sweeter once they arrive.

Advent is often lost in the shuffle, folded into the Christmas season, but it has much to offer on its own. It reminds us to plan and anticipate, to watch and wonder, to read and reflect — and to do all of that secure in the knowledge that what we search for we will find, what we long for will be given to us.

Hair of the Dog

Hair of the Dog

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A grocery store is a funny place to find one’s self on the day after Thanksgiving. There was a hair-of-the-dog quality to it.

On the other hand, it was a very good time to be food shopping. I had the place almost to myself.

I bought more eggs and bread and dinner fixings for tomorrow night (tonight will be leftovers) and some for the week to come. I avoided the Thanksgiving-themed napkins that were 75 percent off. Yes, they’re a good deal, but I won’t be able to find them next year.

In that way, emboldened, I enter the holiday shopping season.

(Alas, I did not shop at a picturesque farmer’s market this morning.)

Giving Thanks

Giving Thanks

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This morning I woke to find two of our three daughters sleeping in the house. They’d returned from the grand adventure of seeing “Hamilton” in Richmond and had driven back here in the wee hours. I wasn’t expecting them till later, so seeing the car in the driveway and finding the two of them asleep in separate corners of the house was the perfect start to a day of giving thanks.

I’ve read that if we forget all other prayers but remember this simple one — “Thank you, Lord” — ours will be a rich prayer life.

It’s so easy (for me, at least) to get caught up in the web of daily cares and to-dos that gratitude, which should be the ballast upon which the rest of life rests, is overlooked. But how hard can it be to say or think “Thank you, Lord” or  “Thank you, ____ [insert Divine Being of your choice]”?

Not hard at all, it would seem. In fact, imminently do-able. So on this bright, windy morning, I remind myself not only to give thanks today, but to give thanks always and everyday for all I have been given.

On Veteran’s Day

On Veteran’s Day

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It’s impossible not to think of my favorite veteran on Veteran’s Day, so Dad will be much on my mind today. And, because it is a federal holiday, I’ll be able to drive into the office and back, creating a more “flow” commute than usual. Beyond these realities, what’s on my mind this Veteran’s Day is that this dear country, which so many have fought and died for, needs us in ways it never has before.

When my son-in-law took the oath of citizenship last August, he pledged to support and defend the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic. Those of us lucky enough to be born here never take such an oath, unless we serve in the military or other public service. But I think many of us would go to great lengths to make this nation a less divisive place.

So what can we do? Maybe something that’s not very complicated. Something that doesn’t require signing up or shipping out. Something like this: that we try every day to understand those on the other side of the political divide.

Dino Walked into a Bar

Dino Walked into a Bar

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The Halloween’ness of yesterday was eclipsed by the World Series win of yesterday … until later in the day, when my office held a party complete with fog machine. There were three folks from one team who collectively dressed as “working remotely” — wearing  robes, slippers and headphones and carrying big bags of chips to munch. They won first prize in the costume competition.

There was a dinosaur, a scarecrow, an Elvis impersonator, a Minnie Mouse and someone dressed as regenerative soil. (After all, I work for a nonprofit development organization with a robust agricultural unit.)

And then there was my fave, because we hatched the plot together, a woman who dressed as the Winrock “mouse” with gray ears and tail … stuck in a sticky trap. The only hitch: this poor woman found just such a creature in her cubicle the very same day.

That’s a little too Halloween for me!

Revelations

Revelations

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In classical Greek it meant the manifestation of a deity to a worshipper. But now the word epiphany can mean other revelations, as well. Just as our society has become more secular, so too have our revelations. We can have epiphanies about our work, our families, our politics.

But to me, all epiphanies have a bit of the divine in them. And it is in part because of epiphanies, the aha moments that come from nowhere, that I believe in the divine.

Because one moment the world is pitiless plain—and the next it is lush mountains and valleys. What can explain the difference? No atoms or molecules, no assemblage of 1s and 0s.

It is wonder, plain and simple. It is waking inside the rainbow. It is the star, a light in the sky that leads us to the divine.

Leaning Tower of Christmas

Leaning Tower of Christmas

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It was, from the start, the tree that couldn’t stand straight. In part, it had no choice. With a curved trunk, it just saw the world a little differently, that’s all. But even when cut and tamed and taken in by a loving family, the tree persisted in its wayward ways.

It took two straightening sessions, the first before it was strung with lights and the second when it was fully decked out with delicate ornaments—and still, it started leaning again.  The new stand may have been the culprit. Or it may just have been the tree itself.

Whatever the cause, I knew by the time I woke up yesterday that the tree was coming down soon, one way or another. I wanted it to be on our terms, not the tree’s. So yesterday we did the sad duty: removed the ornaments, tucked them away in boxes; then the lights; and finally, the tree itself, drug unceremoniously out the back door where it was examined again carefully for castaway ornaments.

I used to put Sousa marches on the stereo, looking ahead to summer, when we did this. Yesterday, it was the jazz station WPFW that provided the accompaniment. I left the cards up, and the cloth wreath in the kitchen, and the little stars that hang from the light fixture and the stockings on the mantel, the nutcrackers on the piano and the little holiday lamp that I loved from the first minute I saw it at the Vale Crafts Fair almost 20 years ago.

Could it have been that long? Yes, it could. And in part for that reason, I don’t get as sad anymore when the tree comes down. The years pass quickly. Next Christmas is right around the corner.

Grateful New Year

Grateful New Year

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As we enter a new year, I’m looking back on the old one, on the trips to Thailand, Nepal, Arkansas, Kentucky, Missouri, Florida, Ireland, Washington and Malawi—more travel than I ever thought I’d experience in 12 months.

I think about the people I’ve met on these wanderings—fellow musicians from my youth orchestra in Lexington, child labor advocates in Lilongwe, women safe tempo drivers in Kathmandu.

I think about my own dear family and how thankful I am for them, for our closeness in good times and tough ones. For the walks in Seattle with Celia, the dog romps in Oak Hill with Claire and the long strolls through Arlington with Suzanne.

Now we have a new month and year, a blank calendar, 365 days to fill. I’m writing my resolutions, cleaning my pantry, plotting my approach. As usual, I’m asking myself to worry less and appreciate more.

I wonder if through the years there’s been a gradual ascent, the steady recognition that living with gratitude is the only way to go. I’d like to think there has been, but progress has been miniscule. I’m thankful today that I have another year in which to try.