Back Home in California
At home two days later.
It is a quiet night. I ride my stationary bike, reading the paper. I talk to Carol and Rick, carpeting or hardwood, how is Mom. “She fell again,” said Carol. “She is so frail,” I said. We agreed.
Later I work on my blog. I sit at the kitchen table. My favorite music of all, Christmas music, plays, instrumental, no words, it is the First Noel on the guitar but with a symphony behind. Earlier they played the Carol of the Bells and I thought of Christmas in Franklin, TN.
I miss them all. I am back in California. The weather is mild, I took a walk today after working at home. But tonite I am having the familiar time of Christmas at home. I have been away from home for a month and now I am here. I never put up a Christmas tree because I was going to be gone. My neighbor Peg, said to my neighbor John, (John, who picked me up from the airporter bus told me this), Peg said, “There is supposed to be a tree there in the window, right there,” and she pointed to the corner window. My house is on a corner facing two streets.
This is the first time in 30 years that there has not been a Christmas Tree blooming there.
I love my neighbors and my neighborhood. It is a gentle neighborhood. It agrees with me. I am glad to be at home. I so love this time of the year. Really, the quiet moments after Christmas pile on each other, one over the other. “In fields as they lay….. keeping their sheep…”
I am so grateful, it spills out after a month away from this place, looking at the familiar pictures on the walls, hearing the familiar carols and realizing how much I missed them when I put on those CDs. The music touches the corners of the rooms, it rings into the moments. I light candles, always green candles of abundance. I laid my new tablecloth, an extravagance I got on sale before I left. It has all my favorite colors. Soon Tim and Carol will be here for my New Year’s Eve dinner of cracked crab.
But now it is this precious moment with the Christmas music playing and the candles lit and I am home in California.
It is a quiet night. I ride my stationary bike, reading the paper. I talk to Carol and Rick, carpeting or hardwood, how is Mom. “She fell again,” said Carol. “She is so frail,” I said. We agreed.
Later I work on my blog. I sit at the kitchen table. My favorite music of all, Christmas music, plays, instrumental, no words, it is the First Noel on the guitar but with a symphony behind. Earlier they played the Carol of the Bells and I thought of Christmas in Franklin, TN.
I miss them all. I am back in California. The weather is mild, I took a walk today after working at home. But tonite I am having the familiar time of Christmas at home. I have been away from home for a month and now I am here. I never put up a Christmas tree because I was going to be gone. My neighbor Peg, said to my neighbor John, (John, who picked me up from the airporter bus told me this), Peg said, “There is supposed to be a tree there in the window, right there,” and she pointed to the corner window. My house is on a corner facing two streets.
This is the first time in 30 years that there has not been a Christmas Tree blooming there.
I love my neighbors and my neighborhood. It is a gentle neighborhood. It agrees with me. I am glad to be at home. I so love this time of the year. Really, the quiet moments after Christmas pile on each other, one over the other. “In fields as they lay….. keeping their sheep…”
I am so grateful, it spills out after a month away from this place, looking at the familiar pictures on the walls, hearing the familiar carols and realizing how much I missed them when I put on those CDs. The music touches the corners of the rooms, it rings into the moments. I light candles, always green candles of abundance. I laid my new tablecloth, an extravagance I got on sale before I left. It has all my favorite colors. Soon Tim and Carol will be here for my New Year’s Eve dinner of cracked crab.
But now it is this precious moment with the Christmas music playing and the candles lit and I am home in California.
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