The Light Fantastic

Raise your hand if you look forward to putting away Christmas decorations. Raise your hand if your decorations fight you while going down. I didn’t think so. You know that disgusting commercial where food fights the person with the sensitive stomach, slapping his/her face with vengeance? That commercial plays in my mind as I try to put away my outside wreath and small tree today. Except instead of becoming horrified, as the actors do, my acid-free belly shakes like a bowl full of jelly. I feel so stupid laughing maniacally alone in the garage slipping a wreath into plastic bags as it lights up with stored solar power.

I pull myself together, stash the still lighted wreath on its shelf and return the small tree to its box. It, too, suddenly comes alive with piercingly bright LED lights. Last year I called these zombie lights, but they are way too much fun for that moniker. For turning my dark, cluttered space into a twinkling, garish, fun garage for a day each year, let’s call them Vegas. They don’t mean any harm – I don’t think. . .

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Sugared Fruit

A picture is worth a thousand words. That’s a good thing because I don’t have time during this season to write a thousand words. Pictures might have to do for a few days. I’ll promise to make them festive, with the help of our beautiful tree.

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The Stars at Night—-

 

Texas Vignette

Men always say not to fret, that everything always manages to get done somehow. Meet “Somehow,” the women of the world. Somehow has had a lot of help this year from her children and husband. Stephen took me to buy the tree–a perfect tree. Days later he appeared at the door just as I was attempting to put the lights on a seven foot tree. Today we brought out ornament boxes and my husband, fresh from another hospital stay, helped hang a goodly portion. There are crazed balls from our first Christmas fifty-one years ago all the way to the ones I added last year. The dough angel and heart I made when the children were small have survived. My youngest child is forty, so that is no small feat. I’m not saying I’m a bad cook, but I must have the only dough  ornaments not eaten by bugs.

 

We have one box to go, but you know what? It will get done somehow. It always does.

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Dreaming of a Green Christmas

My demons battle each other constantly, the one who thrills to Vegas style lights and the other whose dream is to be “off the grid.” To exist on solar and wind power would be the ultimate to demon # 2. Demon #1 encourages those who set the electric meter spinning by electrifying Christmas in their front yards. If we didn’t pile in the car like a bunch of Oakies on the way to California, would they do it? I don’t know, but the Yuletide Galaxy ends at our house. We decorate, just not luminously. Not until this year!

Jerry craved a fat, woodsy smelling tree, to replace our slim artificial. So, this is his year. Today we brought the most beautiful once-live tree home. It would have LED lights. They save up to 90% in electrical usage over regular bulbs. So why not put them on the firebush out front, too? But that is not what is happening. While searching for outside LED mini-lights I run into –be still my heart – outdoor solar mini-lights! Zero electricity! The instructions said it would take 6-8 hours to charge the batteries behind the solar panel. Two cloudy hours later the firebush lit up. You would think we were wildcatters observing a gusher. We could not believe it. The glow is rather faint, but Jerry assures me it will be brighter after an all day charge tomorrow. Of course, we haven’t yet gotten over the miracle of the sun setting our water fountain in motion. We are easily entertained.

So now I’m thinking of a huge lighted wreath between the front windows, maybe light the crepe myrtles at each end of the house. How about down by the pond reflecting off the water? All this would require no electrical cords snaking through the grass, no meters spinning out a January surprise in the power bill. It may not be easy being green, but it is getting easier.

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