Undecking the Halls

Many feel a distinct sadness when Christmas ends and it’s time to start storing away the holiday decorations for yet another year. I don’t.

Christmas, as much as I love it, begins to feel like much too much – and I love the tradition, the beautiful Christmas tree and decorations, and most of all, the special time with my family and my friends. But suddenly, I’m ready, and I welcome clearing the shelves, the tabletops, the windows; you name it, I may have put a holiday decoration there. I’m ready to pare it all down and return to simpler space.

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Resilience

There’s a Japanese red maple tree in my side yard, massive in stature, its normally vibrant, deep red leaves darkened by autumn to a rich purplish-black hue. The tree came to us as a sapling – a gift to my oldest son when he was just a young boy, by a beloved grandfather who would one day betray the grandson he adored.

The tree has weathered much; New Hampshire nor’easters are never a gentle thing, yet the tree persevered and continue to grow no matter what kind of battering came its way. Over the years, it’s not only grown, but flourished, and then a couple of years ago, a particularly treacherous storm almost split the tree in half. We lost about a third of its branches and a piece of its trunk, and I wasn’t sure if it would survive.

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That Crooked Little Finger

It was his pinkie finger that took my breath away. I literally gasped when I saw it. The man himself was fairly nondescript, on TV talking about something—I have no idea what—wearing a billed cap and casual outdoorsy clothes. He was a middle-aged man that I noticed out of the corner of my eye while tidying up my living room. For some reason, the peripheral scene suddenly captured my full focus for a second or two—and then I gasped as his hand came into view.

There was his littlest finger, different from the rest; not just smaller, but crooked, bent at the knuckle joint midway, frozen in its misshapen stance. He couldn’t straighten it if he tried—I know that, because I tried to straighten my father’s pinkie countless times throughout my childhood, convinced that if I just pushed down on it gently enough or maybe this time, firm enough, I could make that finger straight again. It fascinated me.

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Open to the Possibilities

The new year is off and running, and I suspect at a faster speed than I am thus far. In spite of some of my best intentions with nearly two weeks off, far less was accomplished than I had hoped for and mostly because I ended up sick and with two additional days off from work as a result. At least I think I had two additional days off, but they passed in mostly sleep-induced blurs—I know there was a huge snowstorm and I even made a brief call-in for a meeting, but the rest seems far removed from any conscious activity. So here I am, four days into January, four doses of antibiotic in my body and starting to feel almost human once again. Almost.

I’m revving up for what I know will be a busy week ahead. You can’t be out of the office, even during the holiday season, for two weeks and not have a whirlwind of activity just waiting for you to step back into—and we have a new baby heading our way within the next two weeks, too. Everyone’s been sick in the family, including the mom-to-be, and my plan is to jump back into work, have everything ready to lend support to the new family in whatever way they need, and off we’ll go. . . Continue reading “Open to the Possibilities” →

A Not-So-Chance Encounter

There’s seldom a time when I am not aware of the blessings I have, and never more so than during the holiday season when the abundance of my own life seems overflowing in comparison to what so many others are experiencing.

Today was one of reflection as I started the day in a somber mood, remembering a dear friend who passed away unexpectedly seven years ago this very day. I had much to do early in the day, working on an end-of-term final paper and figuring out where I stood with my holiday preparations before heading off to Barnes & Noble to engage in volunteer gift-wrapping to benefit a nonprofit transitional housing program. In thinking about the day, I felt good to be doing something for others and at a place that my friend loved so much, too. It was the type of activity that she and I might have done together and most likely would have done many times over the years had she been here to still participate. Continue reading “A Not-So-Chance Encounter” →

Remembering a Day

My father would have been 86 years old today, and to be honest, I can’t imagine what he would have been like at that advanced age. This is kind of funny given that my mom is 85 and pretty kick-ass in spite of her elder status—or maybe because of it. She has more energy than most people far younger, and more interest in the world at large than many people of any age. And she can throw back a shot like nobody’s business, too.

My dad died back in 2001, which seems like a lifetime ago now. I still miss him everyday and something brings him to mind several times each day. I wish he could see all of his grandkids now—he would be so very proud and pretty fascinated by their ‘adult’ selves.
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Late Fall Ruminations

We’re an introspective lot – women my age – and perhaps it’s because we finally have the time to stop and think about a thing or two. While we’ve all had our own experiences, varying as they may be, one commonality seems to be that we were all incredibly busy; some of us raising a family, others running a business, working very hard to move forward in a challenging career or perhaps even all three. In my own group, everyone’s kids are basically out of the house now and we can finally exhale or at least schedule a bit of time to. Life isn’t any less busy, but it’s busier with things that we have in place for ourselves for a change – organizations we wanted to join earlier in our lives, lessons or courses or maybe just longer hours at work. But it feels different somehow because much of it involves just us for a change.

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Gratitude for a Magical, Manic Month

This has been a memorable, yet exhausting month that began with a landmark family event and ended with a huge event of global proportion that was shared, coincidentally, with the very person involved in the beginning of the month event – and what a month it’s been!

My eldest son married his longtime girlfriend-then-fiancé on September 2^nd, and the rehearsal and dinner were the evening before. While for most, Labor Day weekend is often greeted with sadness, signifying the end of beloved summer, for us it was a weekend to look forward and the primary focus of our summer months. In fact, summer fun seemed secondary this year as we busily prepared for this momentous family event. In a flash, that wonderful weekend was over and we plunged into the next things on the docket as the happy honeymooners made their way to Jamaica. Within a day or so, my youngest son left for his second year of college and all of a sudden, I was alone – living alone for the first time in my entire life; well, as alone as one can be with 3 grown cats, one frisky kitten and two insubordinate dachshunds.

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‘Round and ‘Round She Goes

My life is a carousel ride, a never-ending ‘round and ‘round, busier and busier, sometimes steadier than others and as dizzying as it is at times, I can’t seem to get off the carousel, nor most of the time of the time do I truly want to. I may change horses, get a different vantage point, but generally I’m going ‘round and ‘round at a pace that can be daunting at times to others.

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My Boy Turns Thirty

Today, my oldest son, Sean, turns 30, which makes perfect sense in the general scheme of things, but seems weird to me nonetheless. It’s par for the course for us moms to say things like, “Gosh, it was just yesterday when he was a baby and now look at him,” but the truth is, it doesn’t seem like just yesterday he was a baby at this point nor does it seem like he was really young any time recently, not that he seems particularly old right now. I’m not sure what age he seems to be other than just what he is, but it’s the idea of him being thirty, well. . .that just feels odd. I have a thirty-year old son. Wouldn’t I be old by now if that was true?
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