“A candle loses nothing when it lights another candle.” —Thomas Jefferson

Season’s Greetings, Dear Ones!

A time of great Darkness is upon us… and I don’t just mean politically, emotionally, spiritually… I mean quite literally. Here in the Northern hemisphere, as we lean outward towards the farthest reaches of our earthly orbit, like screaming kids about to wet their pants on a tea-cup ride at the county fair, we feel the struggle between the forces of gravity (of the grave) and the outward pull of centrifugal forces making us cling every harder to whatever center we can grasp. It’s a good ride that leaves us just a little dizzy, just a little scared, and grateful for strong kegel muscles. The night sky descends like stage curtains of crushed velvet filled with glitter earlier and earlier each day as we hurry to do our seasonal chores, decorating, cleaning, and whatever it is we do to Prepare for whatever it is we celebrate. Personally, I usually resent these seasonal exercises, especially if they involve shopping or cleaning. I prefer to think of this time as a good time to hunker by a fire, hide from wolves, sleep a lot, wake occasionally to snuffle towards my pantry to snack on winter stores. It’s inner chipmunk time. Feral women and chipmunks have no need of tinsel or glitter.

But this year, for some reason, I’m really into the spirit of Preparing. Some folk do this by bringing in shrubbery and garlands, colored lights and ornaments. Our beloved Hermit of Hermit Hollow and I prepare by going into the cellar and jacking up the floor joists below my kitchen. We add a twenty-five foot beam and two lally columns. You know, in case the Christmas crowd wants to dance without crashing into the potato bin ten feet below. Or in case I eat so many Christmas cookies I can’t plod across the floor without all the dishes in the big hutch shuddering and clinking as I pass. (It was happening already…) Seven hours later, the kitchen floor is now level and stable. The future clinking of glasses will be hand-held and intentional, not the result of sagging floor joists. And I can eat as many damn cookies as I please. Yee-haw!

“Honestly!” huffs an exasperated Prudence. “Stop thinking about the cookies! A little fasting and praying wouldn’t go amiss, followed by some gruel and repentance.”

I ignore her. I am busy unpacking the Christmas china I have not used in ten years. I’m going for it! This Christmas cottage is going to look like the set of a Hallmark movie if I have to vacuum pine needles until March. I string up garland and lights wherever I can. I overdose on hygge and the scent of pine. And Candles! Can’t have too many candles! I light them every evening.

As I apply a spark to each waxen stick, I think about how it is a time of lighting candles everywhere, in many faiths. My Jewish friends are lighting Menorahs. The Catholics are lighting Advent wreaths. It’s a time of tiny flames and big wishes all around the world. This is a comfort to me as I strike each match. There is a cozy connection to each other as we individually yet collectively face the dark. It’s a deep comfort to believe that all around a globe suffering its share of pain and tyranny, a good many of us are focusing on Mending, Miracles and Preparedness.

Frankly, I think preparedness IS a miracle. Having what we need, having enough to share, these are incredible blessings. (Think back to the weeks in 2020 when we thought we couldn’t buy toilet paper!) I wander into the velvet night, down to the barn to feed the manger scene there, and ponder the stars sparkling above the lighted doorway. Those stars are suns. Vast, unattainable solar systems. And yet, there is barely any light. Up close, a candle lights more than a sun. A candle in a car during a blizzard gives enough warmth to ward off death. Proximity matters more than size.

In my shop, with its wall of seven foot high “e-North-mous windows”, the gloom comes just before four in the afternoon. By five, my canine office manager and I are driving home in pitch blackness. (He’s been urging me to go home since three thirty.) Without the light from my tiny sewing machine bulb, I would not be able to make a straight seam. The darker it gets, the more the tiniest of light illuminates a huge area. I sit hunched in the yellow circle it provides, pondering the shadows.

The advancing holidays invite us to examine our core beliefs—

Who am I? Am I naughty or Nice? (“Definitely Naughty!” insists Prudence.)

Who are Others? Are they deserving of our love, food, time, taxes, or homespun knitwear for which we will have to pull at least two all-nighters? Whom do we love? Do we love them as ourselves? How can we expand our tolerance? Hint: If you are part of a religion telling you whom to hate, get out of it. You are involved in a political movement, not salvation.

Thirdly, what does the future bring? What awaits us round the next bend—a monster or a miracle? December has a lot in common with Life. The more negative our core beliefs, the less we will enjoy Life in general and December in particular. Harmful core beliefs lead to low self-esteem, low other-esteem, depression, anxiety, feelings of inadequacy, or the need to eat cookies until the dishes rattle. For some, December returns us to a childlike anticipation that someday soon, Something Wonderful is coming for us. Meanwhile, we need to “chop wood, carry water” (in my case, quite literally!), and do all kinds of boring stuff to maintain homeostasis and homeo-cheque-book but with renewed hope and optimism undaunted by the current bleakness.

The other thing about December is that every day is Numbered. Literally. Everywhere we look there are cute calendars with sleighs and elves and candy-cane-encrusted versions of memento mori. They seem to say “You might as well have a piece of chocolate, you slacker. Another day is gone forever… and YOU have not yet secured enough bargains, sent enough greeting cards, or remembered to tip your postal delivery person. You only have x # of days to shape up.”

“Now that I know I am not going to live forever, I can relax!” announces my friend with terminal cancer. “I don’t have to do any of that shit anymore!” She sounds enormously relieved and cheery. She is looking forward to a series of visits with her dear ones, that is all. The rest of us, under the illusions that the holidaze matters, continue creating our own tiny tornadoes of activities as core beliefs influence thoughts, thoughts influence feelings, feelings influence behaviors… The more the pressure mounts, the more we are wired to ignore any information what-so-ever that comes into conflict with our core beliefs. I go through great lengths to hire a set of inner lawyers who affirm that I CAN knit an entire afgan in one night if I want to. They tell all the people trying to convince me otherwise that their facts are simply “wrong.” My inner lawyer, who is fed by cookies, has decided that I also have plenty of time to make some new curtains for the dining room.

“Where, exactly, did you go to law school?” I mutter as I struggle to cut seven yards of cotton in a straight line. “Here’s a new fact for you: I’d rather put zippers in down ski jackets all day long than attempt to make curtains for myself. You can tell Prudence I’m chalking this up as penance!”

“I just tell you what you want to hear,” is his blithe, lip-smacking reply.

The cloth squirms under the scissors, the iron belches steam that wilts the fabric, anything cut on the bias tries to turn into a semi-circle. I’m left with uneven rags in out-of-date Buffalo check that I drape from some cast iron hooks driven into the molding above the window.

“These look awful,” admits Prudence, surveying them critically.

“Rustic… Nice… They look plenty straight enough to me,” says the crooked inner lawyer. “And they aren’t big enough to block out any light.”

“What kind of slap-dashery creates a curtain that doesn’t even cover the window?” Prudence wants to know. “Facts CANNOT be manufactured by faulty core beliefs!” she shrieks at the lawyer. She’s decided that, because they are red, they can stay up until Valetine’s day—the “curtains” that is, not the core beliefs. It’s the rag bag for both as soon as possible.

Indeed.

I abandon the curtain chaos to get started on a million other projects. I start to clean the house Nancy-style—you know, by filling the washing machine with laundry but not starting it, and deciding to clean out the entire fridge while the abandoned vacuum cleaner is still running in the other room. Christmas cards are everywhere, just waiting for me to find the list of addresses and a decent pen… I’ll save the afgan, and perhaps another homespun shawl for the last minute. There’s plenty of Time, right? The inner lawyer doesn’t answer. He’s just spotted Party Girl heading for the Christmas Sherry. Prudence is rushing off to call Santa Claus.

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The Light is precious these days, Dear Ones. We don’t need much of it to keep ourselves bright and cheery in our chipmunk coves. Thanks for Being a light, wherever you are Mending. Thanks for spreading sparks of Joy. When life is as dark as it is now—spirits at low ebb, fingers and hearts numb with the coldness that pervades—we don’t need to be great big stars, just little candles, tiny and warm, for those who are right next to us, Waiting. Proximity is everything.

With Sew Much Love,

Yours aye,

Nancy