Normally, I get up at 4:45 a.m., make coffee, pack Jeff’s lunch, and see him off.
I drink my coffee, read the paper, catch up on email. Enjoy some quiet time before the kids wake up and all hell breaks loose.
Yesterday and today, I was up at 4:15, for reasons too boring to get into here.
And yet somehow, even with that extra half hour, I had nowhere enough time to get things done.
It’s not the holidays, either. It’s just me. The knowledge of how much I need to do completely unnerves me, the center cannot hold, and I run around like a chicken with its head cut off, completely ineffective in every way.
I got around to reading yesterday’s paper, today. I’ll get to today’s tomorrow- I hope!
I can’t wait to sleep in tomorrow. To 4:45.
But I have to say- I do enjoy watching the sun rise.
Is it normal to be so thrown from losing a mere 30 minutes sleep? How rigid is your sleep schedule?
“Christmas won’t be Christmas without any presents,” grumbled Jo, lying on the rug.
-Louisa May Alcott, Little Women
Is this post grumbling about presents- or the lack thereof?
No! Today I am like little Beth, speaking “contentedly from her corner”.
Today the holiday season begins in earnest!
I took a class once that spent quite a bit of time on the ideal of “ritual”. A ritual, we concluded, was an actual transport to a sacred time and space. This is what makes this time of year so special; the repetition of these actions generates its own magic, and brings us back to a time that is simpler and sacred.
To me, December is all about tradition and ritual, a way of returning my weary soul to a state of exuberance and grace.
As I share in these seasonal rituals with my children, we are all young and happy together; their young souls and my young soul mingle and touch. When they grow to be adults and share in these rituals with their future children, their own tired and weary souls will re-alight and be reinvogorated in this space.
And their children’s souls will keep company with my own, whether my self remains on this earth or no.
What rituals am I speaking of? Well, for starters, I like to stretch the magic and excitement of the season for as long as possible.
So, every morning a new decoration goes up. And only one.
Today, it was the felt Advent calendar. The numbers have little magnets sewn under them, and the numbered ornaments have magnets in them as well. This is its fifth Christmas, I believe. Every year, the kids forget it exists. And every year I bring it out to chimes of, “Hey, I remember that!”
Secondly, every evening I bring out a Christmas story which I read aloud (to Cassie as the boys hover nearby and pretend not to listen), while we all sip hot chocolate after dinner. I used to wrap these separately, a “gift” a day, but stopped doing that last year because of the paper waste. Now, I wrap each night’s book up in a big bow and leave it on the dining room table for the kids to find.
Tonight’s story: Winter’s Tale: An Original Pop-up Journey by the wonderful, wonderful Robert Sabuda. The last ritual is one that I have been carrying on silently since I was ten, and that is a yearly rereading of Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women .
It’s a long book, and used to serve as a way to fill all those December hours, to help time along so Christmas would hurry up and arrive already.
By this, the 22nd reading, however, I have much of the book by heart, and triptrap along at a frolicking pace.
The simple folk and gentle story transport me to a time of innocence and charity, to be sure, but those first words- “Christmas won’t be Christmas without any presents“- well, those transport me into the soul of a ten year old girl.
The holidays just haven’t started for me until Jo grumbles on that rug.
What officially begins the holidays for you? Do you have any rituals you carry on from your childhood?
How to build your own fisheye lens for $20. Recommended for video cameras and point-and-shoot. Yes, I have sicced my husband onto this project, and I’ll let you know how it goes…
In case you missed it: Letterman gives Sarah Palin’s top 10 excuses for Turkeygate.
Obama wants a “big rambunctious dog, of some sort”, not a “little yappy dog”. Man, I know he’s probably taking some flak for that remark, but I totally agree. We had to put down two senior citizen dogs over the space of a year, and we really miss having a dog; but it would have to be a dog big enough to roll around with and rest your head on. Big enough for a polar bear to hug.
Jeff has fallen in love with this dog, sight unseen, at the local shelter; but I don’t know that that’s in the financial cards this year. Big dogs have big appetites. Plus, we would have to finally sink the electric fence we bought when we first moved here- not the most fun in December, I would think.
What do you think? Big dogs or little dogs?
I’m finally coming out of my post-Thanksgiving stupor. I can’t believe tomorrow is December already!
by the wonderful, wonderful Robert Sabuda.
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