Why wait for the dust to settle? Here are 10 bullets from my end.

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1. Is anything more relaxing than sitting in front of a wood fire? Even when it means sitting on the floor?
2. Gift-buying husbands? Just look! As she says, they’re subjected to indentured shop-itude.
3. First day of winter and the flannel sheets should be on the bed by now, if not earlier. Flip the mattress and rotate, too.
4. Our traditional Christmas dinner includes fresh homegrown Brussels sprouts, which means I’m out in the garden harvesting – sometimes in several feet of snow. Likewise with kale and chard: frost improves the flavor.
5. Let me suggest Mary, as the mother of the church … a slightly different twist on the Nativity story.
6. For someone who’s lived under relentless deadlines, Christmas itself can be seen as another damn deadline. Or series of deadlines. This year, I think I’m ahead.
7. Still, I’m deeply grateful for the sense of release – notes, poems, correspondence … the logjam broken … now that the poems and novels are available.
8. Grandfathers have grandfathers too. In case you’re in one of those inner-child perspectives.
9. What are the theological dimensions of Alzheimer’s or dimentia? Where are the connections – the response ability – when your story gets so fragmented you’re no longer connected to anything you encounter?
10. Tell me something true.

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The mind dances here and there, rarely in a linear fashion. So what’s on my mind these days? How about counting on these fingers?

~*~

1. She’s big on Christmas traditions, including our observing Advent these days. I’m still surprised she inherited none of it in her family! Created it like a radical quilt. Makes this array all the more remarkable, from my perspective.
2. Slush on the windshield. Ice underfoot.
3. Winter’s setting in, though I’m already tired of it.
4. The earliest sunsets of the year have plateau’d and are already inching back in my part of the world. The oppressive late-afternoon darkness will soon be obviously relenting. We don’t wait for the solstice.
5. I like the Eastern Orthodox insight of Mary as the Mother of Light.
6. In reality, I hate being the caretaker, responsible one, cleaner-upper, put-awayer. Contrary to my self-image.
7. It’s been a long road to here. Sometimes it feels like a hangover.
8. In working a seasonal job, she has a curious freedom in not having to worry about being fired, losing the mortgage, and so on. Just put the hours in and go home.
9. Whatever happened to my collection of winter scarves? (As if I really need to ask.)
10. Authenticity: something that speaks to the bones.

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Being mindful of what’s right in front of us can always be a challenge. Here are 10 new items from my end.

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1. Hard to think Christmas is so near. It’s just not in the air, at least for me, despite the bell ringers and carols around the stores. But then I’m often off on another planet.
2. I always intend to put up our outdoor Christmas lights while it’s still warm. Rather than freezing my fingers.
3. I’ve long said if she would only dance, she’d be perfect. OK, there are few other details I’d add, all these years later. Learning to read music, for one.
4. Another old fear? If you get to know me, you won’t like me. Or maybe: You won’t like what you find. (That muscular reaction when someone gets too physically close in a conversation.
5. I seldom I feel myself fitting in – in a crowd, an audience, a group, a family.
6. NOT THE USUAL … one of my strictures in my desire not to repeat myself in blogging. Or anywhere else, for that matter. Not that I usually remember.
7. I miss being able to get the Metropolitan Opera broadcasts on local radio. These days I have to listen on my laptop or cell phone. Just ain’t the same.
8. In a depression.: Do I really LIKE anyone? Being with them? Am I having ANY fun?
9. Well, I am drinking Virgin Marys during Advent. (Cheers in the morning!)
10. You were supposed to save me.

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