Oh, Christmas Tree 2020 Edition: Never Mind, I’ll Do It Myself

It’s 3 o’clock on a Sunday afternoon in early December. My Christmas tree has been up and fully illuminated for over 24 hours. I’m still in my pajamas, completely covered in glitter, and my Christmas tree is mostly naked. 

I can explain.

Actually, it would probably be better if I just summed it up. My Famous Designer Friend from NYC was here and ruined Christmas with his tasteful editions to my usual decor. He gifted me with a beautiful table arrangement of woodland greens, dried corn leaves “locally sourced” from my garden, cones, beautiful fairy lights encased in muted gold mesh globes, and just a hint of glitzy, glamourous-glittery gold spirals to kick it up a notch.

Homespun meets glitz

Unfortunately, kicking it up a notch resulted in knocking it out of the park; making everything else around it seem drab and overwrought by comparison. Try as I might to convince him to make my tree match my table décor, he wouldn’t fall for it. Even my subtle hints about “spilling the beans” on his Great Gramma Goode fell on deaf ears.

Not what I had in mind...

After he left on Sunday morning, I decided that I was perfectly capable of glamming up my own dang Christmas, thank you very much. I’d just do it my own, little-red-hen, self.

Step one: change out the 36 bows I usually use on my tree to 36 new ones. The new ones would add just the right touch of glitz—white ribbon with a micro glitter red and silver candy cane stripe—complete with a sprinkle of oversized glitter to really kick it up a notch. Lovely!

Q: How long can it take to cut and tie 36 bows? A: No matter how long you guessed, double it. Then factor in my—having yanked the bows good and tight in my efforts to even them up—forgetting to insert the wire needed to attach them to the tree. And I don’t have any Christmas ornament hangers. And the hardware stores are now closed.

Using a toothpick to loosen up the knots enough to slide in some tomato wire--we McGyvers use what we have--took much longer than expected.

Suffice it to say, that as of this writing, my tree has 1,660 white lights; 36 handcrafted bows, eight tiny reindeer, one large reindeer and not much else.

Can we call this done? I believe so.

Glamour is hard. “Homespun” really is more my speed, after all. Or maybe it’s not too late to go “Minimalist” after all... 

Oh, Christmas Tree, 2020 Edition

 In Christmas Past, I have long been an advocate of The Perfect Christmas Tree; get a tree, string a MINIMUM of 200 lights per foot—visible from space is the goal. Then garnish in the style of your choosing. With enough lumens illuminating your tree, any lapses in judgement/taste or imperfections of execution will be impossible to see without sunglasses.

Some people do themed trees, and I like to think I do as well. My preferred style has been called “homespun”—I’m not sure it was meant as a compliment—and my theme every year is “Christmas thru the Years.”  Which basically means that every year I just load on all the “stuff” from every year pervious, plus all the new “stuff” I bought the current year. It’s a work in progress. Some years my tree falls over.

This year, my Famous Designer Friend from NYC, who shall remain nameless (Hi Philip!) was “Out Town” doing a Christmas Design for a customer in Gig Harbor. Of course I invited him to visit me-- he’s my FRIEND—we go way back. It was purely a coincidence that my Christmas tree was delivered just a head of his visit.

When Phil—when my Famous Designer Friend from NYC--you might remember him from the three Sume weddings, where he had a starring role as The Only Floral Designer our family would ever even think about using UTILIZING-- he immediately set to work crafting beautiful wreaths, swags and garlands for friends and clients, using woodland materials that were “locally sourced.” And by “locally sourced,” I of course mean I turned him loose in my back yard with a pair of clippers and a bag for moss. I even unplugged the electric fence for him.

Being generous to a fault, my FDFFNYC made me the most beautiful centerpiece for my holiday table while he was working on his planned creations. Then he also whipped up two lovely woodland toppers, complete with beautiful bows, for my two lanterns! My house was beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Nature--with a touch of glitz,

I suggested to FDFFNYC that he might as well glam up my Christmas tree with his special brand of magic while I took a break in the hot tub—watching the creative process was exhausting. Imagine my dismay when I came back to find my Christmas tree looking like this:

Philip Ruins Christmas

 

I guess there’s just no accounting for taste....

 

Next week: Sue does it herself.

Survive Grief Again

 In November, Mom passed away at the age of 90 and I’ve been thinking a lot about grief, again. I didn’t get to say goodbye to her, except in my heart. 

It has now been five years since my husband went out to get gas for his truck. I never saw him again. I had casually said goodbye, and it ended up being so.

In the days and weeks and months---and now years---that followed, I was given a crash course in grief.  I was also given a front row seat to seeing love in action. Loving people willingly walked into the darkness with me and held my hand. I learned much during that time and in the years since. 

I don’t think Americans are comfortable with the thought of grief; we don’t want to look at it, we don’t know how to deal with it. And, to be more honest, I don’t think we realize that you don’t “deal” with grief at all---you just experience it. Grief is not really “manageable” ---it just IS.

I can hear you saying “Gee Sue, thanks for the tip! Survive grief by NOT managing it. Awesome. Very helpful.” I know it seems counter intuitive, we want to DO something, FIX it, stop it, control it. Make the pain and the soul numbing sadness GO AWAY.

But you can’t. And it won’t. Eventually, the pain either lessens, or we become more accustomed to it but I don’t know that it ever STOPS.  At five years in I’m still learning as I go. 

Hydrate. Cry. Repeat.

 

But I DO know how to survive the First Worsts, the first awful year following a loss. The best advice I can give you is to go ahead and GRIEVE. Let it in. Weep. Mourn. Find comfort in Ritual, even if you need to invent one for yourself. Don’t shut off your feelings and don’t let others---as well-meaning as they might be—try to shut your grief down. 

Grieving takes time. Lots of it. Everyone is different, don’t let anyone tell you that you need to “move on.” That’s probably just their blissful ignorance talking---they don’t know the hard truth that you know. You are moving through grief, tears and pain and sadness are a part of that process. Stay hydrated. Seriously—when all else fails, go drink a glass of water. It’s one tiny thing you can DO to make things better. And if it’s not “better”? Well, at least it didn’t make things worse. Some days, that itself is a victory.

A New Gathering Season

 The mornings start off crisp. Frost delineates and magnifies all of nature’s rich detail. The last of the leaves still illuminate individual trees and they blaze when struck by sunlight; a torch raised against the coming of winter, lighting our way.

‘Tis the Gathering Season. We gather the last of the harvest, celebrate the season past and look inward towards the pleasures of the Great Indoors.  We usually gather our friends and family, crowd around a table, snuggle on a sofa. We break bread, we share a toast, and cheer our favorite teams. This Year, we do these things at a distance. We Zoom, we FaceTime, we Socially Distance.

This is still the Season of Gratitude. We count our blessings, inventory our gifts: love, time, health---and whatever the current state of these gifts--- we appreciate what was, what is and what is yet to be. 

Perhaps it is no accident that as the days shorten - we turn our gaze inward, counting our blessings. Instead of cursing the coming dark, we light candles. Candle after candle, blessing after blessing. Once you start counting, more gifts reveal themselves.

There is no shortage of Darkness, maybe even more this year. The Darkness seems closer at hand. But it is not the darkness that draws our eye but the light that stands in opposition. Count your blessings, the song says, name them one by one. Gather your blessings, reclaiming light from darkness. Hold those you love close, in your heart, be they family or friends or furry ones. Remember those you have lost, weep if you need to. Find a way to honor their memory that brings you peace.  

 Breathe in, breathe out. Your body, whatever shape it is in, has brought you to this moment. Give thanks for the body, beautiful in the miracle of its complexities.

Take a moment. Find some quiet in this season to list your blessings. Once you start, the length of your list may surprise you. 

Happy Gathering. 

The cousin bubble: John & Aiden

Even if Socially Distant.

My Problem is I Think I'm Funny

I’m the funniest person I know. Seriously.

I always laugh at my own jokes, no matter how poorly I tell them. Perhaps it’s more accurate to say I always laugh at my own punchlines—because I’ve often forgotten the joke’s set-up and only recall the payoff. Still funny though, even if you had to be there. In my head.

Someone once said, “Blessed are those that can laugh at themselves, for they shall never cease to be amused.” Of course, I don’t remember who said it because remembering the author is more “set-up” than “pay-off”, so there you have it--proof of my earlier assertion. Feel free to know trust me about the Funniest Person thing, too.

Being a Funny Person isn’t without its drawbacks. Occasionally, other people don’t find me as knee-slapping hilarious as I actually am. While I prefer not to have to explain my jokes—or my thinking-- I’m willing to do so if the need arises.

Take, for example, this anecdote: I’m driving home after a successful shopping venture to buy my oldest grandson a Big Boy Bed. We have achieved the bed—now his parents get to convince him that this truly is an upgrade and not part of a clever ploy on the part of his Soon to Make an Appearance Baby Brother to usurp his rightful place in the crib. Since this battle will not affect my sleep quality, I am in a Very Good Mood.

I decide that stopping by a coffee stand and treating myself to a Venti* hot chocolate would be a very celebratory thing to do. (*Venti—from the Latin, meaning “next to biggest size beverage you can buy, it’s a LOT, but since it’s not the BIGGEST, you can still feel as though you are exercising some self-control.”)

I tell the barista that I would like a “Cheery Hot Chocolate,” because, hey, I’m feeling super “cheery” today.

“Cheery?” she asks.

“Cheery!” I say. 

At this point in our exchange, I probably should have added more information, that by “cheery” I meant festive, seasonal, and possibly including sprinkles in my vision of a “cheery,” celebratory hot chocolate. I say none of these things, instead I make another joke, something about “does anybody ever really say no to whip cream?”

To make a long story only slightly shorter, suffice it to say I drove way, sipping a venti hot chocolate that had the weirdest flavor I couldn’t quite place. 

It was, I believe, cherry. Without whipped cream.

I laughed.

So very cherry...I mean CHEERY

I guess you had to be there.