The Christmas Moon

Coming home after the 4:10 pm movie on Christmas Day, we saw a moon that was so huge it looked as if it had bloated itself on holiday ham and sugar cookies and could hardly float. It inspired this journal entry.

Blue Christmas

(words & music by billy hayes - jay johnson)

I’ll have a blue Christmas without you
I'll be so blue just thinking about you
Decorations of red on a green Christmas tree
Won’t be the same dear, if you're not here with me

And when those blue snowflakes start falling
That's when those blue memories start calling
You’ll be doin’ all right, with your Christmas of white
But I'll have a blue, blue, blue, blue Christmas

You’ll be doin’ all right, with your Christmas of white,
But I'll have a blue, blue Christmas

Hark!

Although I personally believe that angels in their true form are fearsome and awe inspiring rather than Hallmark cherubs, I've recently been moved to create anthropormorphic angels. In other words, Tis the Season.

Speaking My Peace

Sometimes, pictures speak better than words. Some entries from my visual journal.

A Different Kind of Sleigh Ride

Right now, on stages all over America, there are little girls in pink toe shoes fluttering like butterflies to the sound of Tchaikovsky. Like the tree in Rockefeller Center and mall Santas, it's one of the more beloved reminders that The Season is here once more. So why don't I feel more jolly?

There must be a list somewhere of the people for whom the holidays are especially difficult -- victims of loss, the divorced, single parents, those from dysfunctional families, orphans, lone travelers, civil servants, doctors and nurses who must work, patients, American Jews, in fact, I could probably continue until I include every one of us. Some, like me, fall into two or three of these categories.

When did love and joy become supplanted by stress and loss? If you're no longer invited to the feast because your kid's stepmother demanded of your in-laws, who included you in the last 20 Christmases, to leave you out and you have no place else to go -- how are you supposed to make happy and merry?

I wonder if it's too late to make reservations on the Island of Misfit Toys? Or perhaps I should give the Rat King a call. I'll bet he doesn't have plans for Christmas.

The Shortest Commute

My commute has grown shorter of late. A job layoff combined with the sudden need for some fairly heavy-duty surgery has given me a commuting range no further than my kitchen. However, I've been using it to explore a different side of myself while I heal and job hunt. Above is one of my commutations to the land of color.