Happy Christmas to all!

It’s a beautiful sunny day here. We had a lovely Christmas morning with Mum and Dad, Hils, Hannah, and Terence, and the four of us opening packages. The children were delighted. Now Grace is playing with her new toys, Whit and Matt are sleeping, and I’m about to go for a quick Christmas run.

This year my favorite Christmas card message is Henry and Elizabeth’s. It’s been running through my head all day:

An Endless Allelulia

That’s the moon through my office window at 5:30 this morning. Had the most horrific insomnia last night. I got about 3 hours of sleep and am swimming underwater through my day as a result. It’s not the happiest Christmas Eve inside the black hole of my head. I hope it’s better for the rest of you out there in la la land.

Just wanted to post this fantabuloso picture of Hils, T, and the delicious Miss Hannah. So excited that they are here for Christmas and to spend some time together over the next few days.

It is said that the dominant influences on F Scott Fitzgerald were:

“aspiration, literature, Princeton, Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald, and alcohol.”

Snowy view out my window on this solstice day. I think it’s going to be a white Christmas, which is always fun. Tonight we’ll celebrate, with the Vogts and the 30+ year tradition. The Woods will be with us which it really special. And this weekend I’ll get to see Hadley and John and their children, as well as other dear friends.
As always, I’m thinking about those I love most fiercely on this short and meaningful day. Today’s the fulcrum on which the dark and the light pivot. On this darkest day of the year, I usually feel quite light, full of love for those nearest to me and anticipating the increasing lengthening of days.
I remember one solstice, several years ago, in particular. It had been a sunny day, so the sunset was more marked than today’s will be. I was at the gym, running and looking out the window as the sun went down. It really struck me, that sunset: it looked like one of those pictures taken from space, where you could see the orange shining from beyond the edge of the curved darkness – I felt aware of all of those who had died, as though I could see them, almost, just beyond the horizon. I don’t know why that moment, and that afternoon, has stayed so vividly in my memory but I always think of it on this day – and think of Nana, and Gaga, and Ba, and Susie, and Mr. Valhouli, and others who have gone ahead of us into the sunset. Into, a place, I trust, with far more light than we ever see here on earth.