Dimmest and Brightest Month

Dimmest and brightest month am I;
My shortest days end, my lengthening days begin;
What matters more or less Sun in the sky,
When all is Sun within? –C. G. Rossetti

It’s been a slow start this morning. I’m blaming the solstice for my coach potato start: do you really expect vigor on the longest day of the year? Despite these dark days, the philodendron in the bathroom is in the process of sprouting three new leaves. I appreciate its jaunty sense of optimism.

It’s also lovely to know that from this point onward, the days will grow longer and longer. We’ve been burning candles every night for the last couple weeks, holding on to every bit of light in our lives right now. Spring may be a long ways off, but today we get the first signal that it’s truly on its way.

We five girls had a wonderful holiday gathering in Duluth this Saturday. I wish we did this every month instead of every year. I miss them all and our girly martini-sipping nights out. We’ll try to coordinate another get-together this spring, but it’s always a minor miracle when the stairs align – what with relationships, work, and school – for us to reunite for a weekend.

I finished up the Christmas shopping yesterday when I ran errands in Duluth and now all the gifts are all wrapped and stashed in the corner. This past Friday, Andy and I helped my mom and aunt bake approximately 10 different kinds of Christmas cookies for the church cookie sale. It took a long time, but the finished products looked nice and tasted wonderful. Bon Appetit’s recipe for cardamom orange cookies is probably the best rolled sugar cookie I’ve ever tasted.  The Christmas plans have been settled on: we will spend Christmas Eve and morning with Andy’s family and then head down for a mid-afternoon meal with my family. It’s been a lovely holiday season so far.

I put in a call in this morning to another interviewee for the current article I’m working on. I’d been hoping to write the article based off of the one interview I’ve already conducted, but as it came time to put pen to paper, it became clear that I should probably talk to at least one more person about the event. Although the article isn’t due for another ten days, with it being in the midst of the holiday season, I’m feeling like a procrastinator. I know I can write the article with just the one source so hopefully that should curb any sense of rising panic about the deadline. This current interview I’m chasing is just to make the article better.

Speaking of pushing things to the last minute, I’ve not heard anything about returning to work. Since the restaurant’s meant to open again this Saturday, I’m getting a bit anxious to know what’s going on. I really don’t have a spontaneous personality, especially when holiday plans are at stake.

We got about four inches of fluffy snow last night. It made the drive home slow, but it sure makes everything pretty and I know the local businesses are glad for it. It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas . . . .

Off to the novel and some rewrites.