It's after midnight. I definitely have to go back to work tomorrow. I'll go mad if I stay home anymore. I feel better, although not what I would call well. If I were sensible, heck, if I were well, I'd go to bed now. But I've been in bed a lot the last 72 hours, and my back isn't happy about it. Also, I've got to wrap the presents for my co-workers as tomorrow night is our Office Holiday Party. Our one big night a year at a delicious and expensive Italian restaurant, and I can't taste anything other than Sucrets. Back to it, then, continue rolling the glass ornaments into bubble-wrap sheets and taping them closed.
Keiko has been helping me with this task by sitting very close to the shiny wrapping paper and reaching out to paw delicately at the ribbons, tags, and anything else that momentarily dangles. Natasha is sitting next to me on a chair staring intently at these shenanigans. Dixie is lying behind my chair, sighing heavily in her sleep and occasionally woofing. John is sound asleep, I believe, or at least enjoying the unusual experience of having the whole bed to himself, sans sneezing wife and snuggling cats. Why is it cats seem to expand to twice their natural body mass when they lie down? I swear these two take up as much room as an entire third person.
We went out tonight and bought our Christmas tree. We went to three different lots, discovering at each place that most of the trees were terribly dry at the top. We finally picked one out, though, and trundled home with it tied on top of our car. It's in the stand, now, having a drink of water and shedding a few needles as the branches drop. Maybe Friday I'll have time to decorate it. I hate leaving the tree until this late, I really do. It seems like I don't have enough time to enjoy it when Christmas is a mere ten days away. I'm definitely not going to do tinsel this year. Tinsel is so time consuming that I want to see it for a miniumum of three weeks. We'll use the old garlands one more time.
I have several new ornaments for the tree. I collect them throughout the year. For instance, I found a Scandanavian-style white coated Santa on an owl's back, and the gingerbread man you see in this month's index, at a shop in Cedarburg, Wisconsin this summer. I picked up a nifty owl ornament made of leaves and husks and bits of wood at Pier 1 in September. And last week I found a carved Santa star which is just the thing for a large gap in the branches. I love folk art ornaments. I'd love to have some large, standing carved pieces for the front porch area, but after losing my cement pig to heartless thieves I'm afraid to put anything out there at all, even a nice wreath. The only evidence of our Christmas spirit will have to be a glimpse of our tree through the front window. I'm keeping my things inside where I can enjoy them every day.
And night. I have a feeling I'll be up late for the next ten days as I finish the hundred small tasks necessary before the holiday begins. My reward will be to sit for a few minutes, all other lights off, just before bedtime, and look at the tree lights twinkling. I always take my glasses off and drink in the colored stars that shrink and expand as my pupils constantly adjust. Since I was a little girl I've snuck out to the Christmas tree and turned the lights on long after everyone else was in bed. I never was all that concerned about the packages under the tree. I just loved the spectacle of light, glinting off shiny paper, glimmering among the dark green branchs of the fir tree, reflecting off the ornaments, a kaleidoscope of colors.
I still do.
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