Occupy Christmas

Reinventing family traditions after a divorce can be a real challenge, so I'm delighted to be in the 5th year of an annual Christmas Party thrown by my kids' father, his new wife, Bonnie, and me and my partner, Cindy. Splitting the costs and labor, the four of us start prepping for the party in September. Then each year, despite incredibly busy lives, our 3 children and their families--14 grandkids in all-- come together on a Sunday afternoon in December to make merry. A trimmed tree, lights and streamers, food, gifts and stockings are part of the mix, but also lots of catching up for both kids and adults. Though we all live in the same county, we lead full, rich lives, so connections are haphazard and intermittent and rarely involve the whole crowd. Speaking for myself, the best part of this party is the chance to make memorable connections with cousins, in-laws, uncles and aunts. Of course, the kids are pretty interested in the gifts and stockings too.

This year we ran into some hurdles. Our finances got murky, and Cindy and I weren't able to squirrel away a regular monthly deposit to our Christmas fund. Raymond was scheduled for knee replacement surgery three weeks before the party, and we knew he would not be doing much elfing. Plus, he was very entrenched in the local "Occupy" movement, and he wanted to Occupy Christmas. For a brief moment, we considered canceling the party this year, but that idea went up in a poof of smoke. Instead, we put on our thinking caps and started modifying our usual modus operandi, especially when it came to gifts.

We began with the Occupy Christmas motif and grabbed the idea to choose gifts that were made in the USA. Then we decided we wanted to involve local merchants or businesses somehow. The year before, I had come up with the idea of including one personal treasure that belonged to one of us in each stocking. We decided to include those treasures in the main gift and ask the grandkids to each contribute 3 small treasures of their own as stocking stuffers. We gave them stickers, asked them to attach their names to the items, and we collected them the Sunday before Thanksgiving. The kids complied with a delightful array of things from compasses to toy cars to nail polish.

On the Sunday after Thanksgiving, the day before Raymond's surgery, we met to decide which kids would get which treasures in their gifts and stockings. This was a super fun chore. When one of us suggested a certain treasure for one of the children, we went with it, totally trusting our very first instincts. I named Huck recipient of my magnetic poetry. Cindy thought Leon should have Nell's dream oil. Bonnie thought Anna Mae would like her sleep mask. Raymond dropped the hacky-sacks into Aliou's pile.  For the main gift, we had ordered American made bath sheets for each child and hired a local seamstress to appliqué each child's name on his or her towel.

I admit to a bit of trepidation the morning of the party. Would the kids be disappointed with this variant on previous parties?  Definitely not!  The smiles, laughter and shouts rang with full-fledged Christmas wonder. Huck wore his towel like a toga for an hour after opening it. Mary Autumn and Nell lined their gifts on the floor beside the tree to admire. Leon pumped dream oil on anyone who approached him, and the four who got our headlamps ran out in the dark to play.

Granddaddy had to leave early as this was the most activity his bionic knee had seen in weeks, but everyone else stayed late-- occupying Christmas.

Prose Poem

During our recent redecoration of the guest bathroom, the toilet sat in the living room for several days, calling to mind Russell Edson's prose poem, "With Sincerest Regrets."

Like a white snail the toilet slides into the living room demanding to be loved.

It is impossible, and we tender our sincerest regrets.

In the book of the heart there is no mention made of plumbing.

And though we have spent our intimacy many times with you, you belong to an unfortunate reference, which we would rather not embrace . . .

The toilet slides out of the living room like a white snail, flushing with grief . . .

Absence

I think this might be the longest stretch I've gone without posting to Twilightme since I started this blog 2 years ago. Though no new posts have appeared for several weeks, I've written many in my head, so the absence of messages has nothing to do with the absence of material. Maybe it has to do with the absence of coffee, however. (See previous post here.)

There's no doubt that my morning routine is altered. While coffee reved me into a writing frenzy each morning, the cup of tea that I now drink puts me more into the mood for reading and meditating. I'm enjoying this much more mellow start to the day despite the occasional sensation that something is missing. What's missing is not exactly energy but less sense of urgency. I sure don't get done what I used to in the morning, but I am doing things that feel satisfying.

Once launched into the day, things are as busy as ever: home school, yoga, college work, free lance projects, yard work, family occasions--a list that defies the magnitude of activity in my days. Here is an example of a day in the life of PH sans coffee:

Last Friday started with Yoga class. I love Friday's gentle yoga class. It's all women of my age 60+ and my brother John :) Cherie takes us through long, slow gentle stretches that feel exquisite. After class, she and Kath and I talked about the yoga/writing class. We opted out of doing it at Baker Station this year, but we talked about the possibility of doing a private class somewhere this summer. This month's Poets & Writers had an article about yoga/writing retreats and the three of us started dreaming how we could make such a retreat happen: where/when/what, etc. We each took on a little assignment to do some investigating and we'll report back next week to reconsider the idea. The energy of the 3 of us makes me think we can make it happen.

Then it was off to the Raleigh's for homeschool. The kids did oral reports in preparation for their trip to the wild animal exhibit at the college. They each researched one animal named in the press release. Even 7 year old Candice did a talk on the blue-tongued skink which we all thought was a typo for skunk but turned out to be a lizard. They did a great job. I brought cup cakes for Candice's birthday, frosted in pink, which we ate after we had lunch together. Then we reviewed their essays for a contest sponsored by the college and prepared them for mailing. Then Taylor gave me a pedicure while I visited with Raleigh who had great ideas about how to deal with my VW lease situation.

Next, I went to Julia's to work on the Women Inventors book. We had a phone interview with this dynamic woman who lives in Colorado who invented a product for nursing mothers, called the Nursing Nest which is being used in hospitals around the country. We talked to her for an hour and half, tape recording the interview. I will transcribe the tape in preparation for completing her chapter. This project is truly fascinating as these women make their inventions happen against unbelievable odds and challenges. I think it's going to be a fabulous book.

I rushed home where Cindy had dinner waiting. Then we headed to Murphys to see "Escanaba in da Moonlight," a play that I reviewed for the Democrat. We got home at 11. I was so tired that I was wired. So I drank a cup of chamomile tea and made an outline for my review. I didn't go to bed until 12:30.

This is a typical day in my life right now . . . LONG and with no absence of FUN!!