Monthly Archives: December 2020

Ringing out the year

Posted on by
Reply

I have so many things I want to write about today! Reading, the end of this seemingly endless year, the deer that visited our front yard overnight while we slept…

Let’s start there, with the deer.

I took this photo thinking it would be a Wordless Wednesday post here on the blog. Then I got up this morning and wrote it into my #frontstooppoetry for the day. So, words, which means not wordless.

My husband and I saw this in the snow when we opened the gate from our side yard to head out to the sidewalk for our first walk of the day yesterday.

#frontstooppoetry by Kim Kishbaugh Who were you? / Doe, fawn or buck / who nibbled from the lilac / and left this / single hoof print / in the snow? (Dec. 31, 2020)

A single deer had walked right into the branches of our front-yard lilac tree, and from there we couldn’t tell where it had gone. Right on through? Maybe, but the tracks on the other side were definitely a rabbit’s. Either a rabbit obscured deer tracks, or the deer backed out the way it came. We could see only about three hoof prints, so it’s possible this deer used the sidewalk and veered into our yard only for a quick snack. I’ve seen it happen in the daylight. I know lots of people consider deer pests; to me, they’re graceful and beautiful creatures, with whom I’m generally happy to share a garden. It brightened my day to know I had hosted one in the wee hours.

Reading out the year

Lots of my friends are tallying up the books they’ve read this year and sharing the numbers on social media. Not me. I’ve found reading difficult this year. Oftentimes I’ve found myself too anxious to focus on reading anything longer than a poem, and for a short while leading up to and following Election Day, I couldn’t even read poetry. As a friend said to me recently, my relationship with books has been a troubled one. On the bright side, I’ve actually read more poetry books than usual this year. Among the ones I finished the year with was The Abridged History of Rainfall, by Jay Hopler (McSweeney’s Press), which is absolutely super. One poem in it, Elegy for the Living, is so heartbreakingly beautiful that I was compelled to read it aloud for the Twitterverse:

My unread book pile grew the other day when a friend emailed to ask if he had loaned me a book that he couldn’t find. He had not, but I’m pretty sure I own the book, and I thought, “If I can find it and have already read it, I can just pass it along to him”—an elegant solution to get him the book he wanted and clear one object out of my too-cluttered life, don’t you think?

You can probably tell already that this didn’t work out as planned.

I, too, found that I couldn’t track down this book, which for all I know might have decided to take a forbidden vacation with its sibling of the same name from my friend’s book collection.

But in the process of looking for it, I came across three other books that I had forgotten I had and really do want to read: two murder mysteries and Joe Biden’s book about the death of his son Beau, Promise Me, Dad. So those vaulted directly to the top of my next-read pile. The good news is that I’ve just finished reading one of them. Care to guess which one?

As we’re counting down the days to Inauguration Day 2021, and I’m looking forward to change in the White House—and, I hope, the country—it seemed appropriate to end 2020 with Biden’s memoir. I took the rediscovery of this book as a sign that the time was right to get to know my next president a little better. I’m glad I did. Although, of course, I cried at the end. So be forewarned.

Next up is one of the murder mysteries, a little lightness to start the new year.

My husband’s political advent calendar

Speaking of lightness, the new year, and the countdown to Inauguration Day…over on Escape into Life my husband, renowned cartoonist Phil Maish, has created a post-Christmas advent calendar to count down the last days of the current White House administration. Each day he opens a new door to show a new cartoon. Day 25 will be Inauguration Day.

Here’s yesterday’s cartoon, the most recent as I’m typing this but probably not the most recent as you’re reading. So here’s the growing archive of all open doors.

Ending the year on a high note

After the overnight snowstorm that revealed the deer tracks yesterday morning, we had an utterly gorgeous day today, sunny and clear and crisp. The husband and I took a nice walk, to and through a neighborhood park, and I couldn’t resist taking a few photos, including the one at the top of this post. It was a simply perfect winter day; I couldn’t have asked for a better one to end 2020. We’ll be spending our New Year’s Eve the way we like best: watching Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers movies and trying to stay awake until midnight. Tomorrow’s lentil soup is already made, and the traditional Swedish rice pudding will follow it up; if I recall correctly, we started 2020 without either of those good-luck staples, and look where that got us.

#frontstooppoetry by Kim Kishbaugh - Winter Storm Morning It felt rather good / to shovel off all the crap / of 2020 (Dec. 30, 2020)

Random thoughts post-Christmas

Posted on by
Reply
Snow on a metal railing

I was 43 years old when my mother died. In all those years, never once did I spend Christmas Eve away from her. Christmas Day, yes, but not Christmas Eve, which was always the day of feasting and family gathering in my childhood home.

That realization hit me on the morning of December 24 this year—because my son was spending his first Christmas Eve apart from his father and me, thank you COVID-19. Everything is so upside-downsy this year, backwards, sideways, wibbledy-wobbledy, just plain wrong. And so my son has now done this thing that I never did. And it’s not the worst thing in the world, but it’s sad and bittersweet, and I hope it doesn’t open the door to the idea that being apart on this special day is okay for us.

Christmas tea
Christmas tea

We did trade texts throughout the day, and Zoom allowed us to open presents together on Christmas morning, so that tradition remains alive. The husband and I spent Christmas Eve watching movies with one of my sisters-in-law, again via Zoom, and Christmas Day online with the family and friends we traditionally gather with in person. This time, each set of us was parked in front of our own personal Christmas tea, instead of joined at a communal tea. Tradition, but not tradition.

Sigh.

Random side note, because COVID

I’m heartened to see my friends and family who are doctors and nurses sharing the happy news that they’ve received their first COVID-19 vaccinations. I don’t think these vaccines are the be-all/end-all that will save civilization, but they’re a step in the right direction. They offer hope, and I for one badly need that hope. Poet Billy Collins got his first vaccination today also. Poets are definitely essential, so hooray!

Solstice: Making do, making new

Posted on by
Reply
Christmas creche ornament on lit tree

We’ve made it through the darkest day of this year, and I’m thinking about silver linings. I don’t know about you, but I’ve been cooped up since March 13. In all that time, I’ve been inside one store, once. I’ve seen a handful of friends at a distance in my yard or theirs. I’ve spent two days with my son and hugged no one but him and my husband. Thanksgiving happened by Zoom. Christmas will as well.

This hasn’t been easy. Emotionally, I’m on a hair trigger, ready to start yelling or crying at any moment. Look at me crosswise, and I’m likely to erupt. And I know I’m not special; there are thousands of us all over the country in the same shape.

But I’m managing to find silver linings this holiday season. Separated by 2,000 miles at Thanksgiving, my son and I got together on Skype, and I taught him to make pie. That wouldn’t have happened in a normal year because he would have had someone else to provide Thanksgiving pie, either me or a friend. Still unable to travel home, he’s now planning to make cherry pie for Christmas.

Silver lining.

I, too, did some extra cooking at Thanksgiving: I made miniature pies for all of the local relatives and friends we normally would have spent the holiday with. And then I made bread for them, too, while I was at it. I sent all of those off with the husband (my personal shopper and task rabbit), and he delivered them—at social distance—with our love. It made me happy, and I think it did the same for him and the recipients.

Silver lining.

Christmas is a different challenge. It will be the first we’ve ever spent without our son since he was born. So I baked a batch of his favorite Christmas cookies and shipped them to him. I also sent him a miniature artificial Christmas tree and his favorite set of Christmas ornaments—five, one-inch-tall “misfit toys” from the original Rudolph cartoon. Then I got out my paper and scissors and glitter and glue gun and made him ornaments from pictures of our two dogs. I can’t describe how excited it made me to put those together and mail them off to him as a surprise. I can tell you, though, that I then did the same for the co-workers for whom I could find pictures of their pets.

Yes, I’m making do. But occasionally I’m doing more than that: I’m making new celebrations and perhaps memories. I’m not going to say it makes up for the horror of this pandemic. It doesn’t. But it has helped me get through, and it helps my mental outlook to focus on these bright spots.

And lest you think this blog post is all holiday lights and cheer, let me assure you I’m still on a hair trigger. Just ask my husband.

Holiday memories

Posted on by
Reply
Christmas tree with homemade cattle dog ornament

One of the things I love most about holidays, especially Christmas, is remembering. Every ornament—and we have a lot (a lot)—has a memory attached, a story. Every recipe comes from someone I love. The very activity of decorating reminds me of putting up the tree with my mother, both as a child and as an adult after she suffered a series of strokes and came to live with us. She couldn’t hold and hang ornaments any longer, so I would unwrap each one and bring it to her to see on the couch. We’d remember together each one from my childhood, and I’d tell her the stories of the ones I’ve acquired as an adult.

Christmas ornament on tree: glass policeman/bobby

Here’s the glass police officer we found in the bargain bin in Marshall Field’s basement on State Street after Christmas one year. Here’s the clear plastic globe with angel inside, which hung each year on the mini-tree in the bedroom I shared with my sister. And here’s one of the glitter-swirled silver balls that were among my mother’s first Christmas ornaments and that she disliked for their ancient tattiness by the time I was born, the glitter all turned dark; she relegated those to the inside of the tree, where they might add sparkle but not be seen for the ancient things they were. I hang them in places of honor because of the memory they evoke.

Christmas ornament on tree: antique baby head

Our tree holds ornaments from my husband’s family, too. Here’s a favorite: a fragile, glass baby head that seems almost macabre on a Christmas tree. (We’ve given it fellowship with other, newer oddities: aliens and skeletons, Krampus, a luchador.) Wait, here’s an equally cherished relic: the faded yellow, lumpen fruit or veg with a face. We don’t even know what it is—melon? squash? clown?—but we love it dearly. There’s the fuzzy old snowman from my husband’s childhood, and scattered around are ornaments we gave to his mother, which made their way back to us after his parents died.

Christmas ornament on tree: antique and unidentifiable

When we excavate the ornament boxes, we find ones we bought as a young couple, ones given to us over the years by friends, and a whole set of ornaments collected and repurposed from special occasions. These started life as table decorations at friends’ weddings, my grandparents’ silver wedding anniversary, and other life celebrations; as Christmas ornaments, they’re mementos that bring back these occasions, along with the loved ones who were there.

And, of course, my husband and I are parents, so there are ornaments our son made as a child. These keep company with two rather ugly baubles that my sister and I made as children, hand-painted and decked out with glitter. Again, the word tatty is apt, but their very tattiness endears them to me.

This, I think, is what makes holidays special: their ability to evoke cherished memories and remind us of loved ones. Perhaps it’s why we reach out to loved ones on holidays also, with phone calls and texts, cards and postcards. Our Christmas cards this year, as in many years, are drawn by my cartoonist husband, so each one we send shares a bit of him with the recipient. I make cookies and pesto and sugared nuts as gifts; he makes a drawing. We give them all as reminders of our love. They connect us with those we love, even in this very distant time.

Winter's Holidays: #frontstooppoem by Kim Kishbaugh