February 4 and 5, 2014

yesterday

today

What a difference a day makes. Yesterday the snow was melting off the roof of the barn in a sheet of dripping water.  Today the snow is coming down in force and a soft light fills the house.

Snow day! My writing class in Concord was canceled for today and I feel the thrill of freedom, even though I enjoy teaching and will have to add an extra class at the end. But I like the feeling when everything stops.  I remember delivering Girl Scout cookies up and down Oak Ridge Avenue with Gay Parker during a snow storm, pulling a sled behind us, knocking on each door and delivering boxes of thin mints.

What are your memories of a snow day?

January Sunday

2013 word of the year

SELFIE has been proclaimed the 2013 word of the year by The Oxford Dictionary. In honor of the official introduction of a new word, I decided to take one of myself with the dogs on a snowy, freezing walk last weekend. Below: the first selfie of 2014.

Happy New Year Everyone!

Happy Birthday to the Best Sister Ever!

You were always there, ten years ahead of me.  At seven,  I went downstairs every morning to get your freshly ironed Kent Place uniform from the laundry room and even though mom said that I shouldn't do that for you because I would be late for school, I did it anyway.  I would do anything for the chance to enter your room which was filled with all the teen age trappings of a sister who had entered a world I could barely imagine.  You once said, "if you want to know anything about stuff, ask me. Mom won't tell you anything." So it was you I turned to and still do.

When I was thirteen, you were married and drove west for a new life in California. "You will visit me," you announced. And so I did. I got to experience Golden Gate Park in the 60's, where Country Joe and the Fish played free concerts and hippies wore flowers in their hair. At sixteen, we camped in Wyoming.  Years later, I traveled with my young daughters to your Oregon Farm where they climbed trees to pick cherries and rattled the bucket to call in your sheep.

Now it's Portland that we explore when I come west. We take art classes and sit at Townsend on Alberta Street, sharing a pot of  Immortalizer Tea.  More and more we reflect on the mystery of it all.

 Happy Seventieth Rue.
 I wish for you a year of deep peace, good health, and good times.

Christmas Eve morning!

Shopping list divided into three! Power team!

the shortest day

I woke at 6 am this morning to the repeated sound of a great horned owl in our woods. The waning full moon shone in the window creating yellow patterns on the  wooden floor.  How could I not get up in the dark lit by the moon and put the kettle on for a cup of tea?  After doing some writing, I checked The Writer's Almanac which arrives in my email every morning and read what I have pasted in below. I try not to miss a chance to notice what is happening beyond the world of people and Christmas craziness (so many cars, so much frenzy!) 

The earth turns and rotates on its axis, the days will grow longer starting tomorrow, we can look forward to brighter days by February.  Christmas  Day provides a time out from a busy world. It is a time to listen for the owl and each other. May we all listen below the surface of our words to deep knowing.

 Listen, Pause and then Speak.

 We've got plenty of time.

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In the Northern Hemisphere, today is the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year and the longest night. It's officially the first day of winter and one of the oldest-known holidays in human history. 

Anthropologists believe that solstice celebrations go back at least 30,000 years, before humans even began farming on a large scale. Many of the most ancient stone structures made by human beings were designed to pinpoint the precise date of the solstice. The stone circles of Stonehenge were arranged to receive the first rays of midwinter sun.

Some ancient peoples believed that because daylight was waning, it might go away forever, so they lit huge bonfires to tempt the sun to come back. The tradition of decorating our houses and our trees with lights at this time of year is passed down from those ancient bonfires. In ancient Egypt and Syria, people celebrated the winter solstice as the sun's birthday.

Henry David Thoreau said: "In winter we lead a more inward life. Our hearts are warm and cheery, like cottages under drifts, whose windows and doors are half concealed, but from whose chimneys the smoke cheerfully ascends."

the whole family and visitors!

The manger was a crowded place on Christmas Eve!

Taking this photo was challenging, trying to get everyone in.

Kings- move in.

Angels- spread out.

Cows- we can't see you.

etcetera.

I am reminded of those five years that I directed a Christmas Pageant at 

The First Parish Church.

A living creche!

I like the silence of this one.

The only thing missing is chickens.

The South American Creches usually include a rooster.

Of course.