Cath, etc.

Christmas Greetings from Our House to Yours

It's been a year now since Mark and I left our home in Utah to begin a new life in New Hampshire. We've been busy, busy, busy settling in, adjusting, and making our house a home. And while it has been one of the most challenging experiences either one of us have ever been through, there's nothing like a little Christmas to make you feel right at home.

We've decked the halls (quite literally):

...and added a faux mantel to the new fireplace:

(Who knew? All you need is some bookshelves and some screws and voila! Instant mantle!)

Our snowfriends are happy in their customary spot--the kitchen window--where we get so much sun in the wintertime, I'm worried they might start to melt:

There are some sparkles in the sun-drenched dining room:

...and some carollers in the entryway:

Outside, the lamppost is festive:

The wreaths add some cheer:

(And like good New Englanders, there are candles in every window.)




Even the birds seem to be celebrating:

For little by little, bit by bit, this house is starting to feel comfortable and familiar:

A cherished spot where we wake up to sunrises such as these:

Our daily dose of enchantment from this magical place we {now} call home.

Merry Christmas to you and yours from me and mine in the 'Shire!

The Gesture

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I placed my wrists at my laptop, positioning them just so, readying my fingers to form a sentence.

And by placing them, I mean I lifted my forearms, settled the inside of my wrists against their customary resting place, and watched my knuckles round in a high, graceful arch, as though I were at the piano. Index fingers on "f" and "j," the remaining digits spanning the row, as though the keys beneath would play a scale or an arpeggio beginning on middle "C."

And I am five years old in Carol Hurst's piano studio, learning proper hand position as passed down from the masters. Wrists down. Knuckles high. Fingers round. Pads flat. Elegant as a ballet.

When scales become sentences, arpeggios morph into paragraphs, etudes--poetic blog posts, and concertos become other large-scale works that lie dormant on a CD-R someplace dark.

My hands at the keyboard, my daily practice.

The best of all instructors.

Now

I block out days. I post ahead. I make my way to them.

I stay in their homes. I sleep in their beds. I cook with their pots and pans.

I rent a car. I stock the fridge. I hug them extra long.

I do the dishes. I pick up the tab. I listen with open heart.

I check their welfare. I gauge their joy. I comfort when tears arise.

I laugh more often. I cry more, too. I wish it could all be the same.

I yearn for the past. I chip at the now. I trust that change is good.

I believe in our growth. I have faith in the path. Yet I'd kill for a crystal ball.

I leave them with tears. I fly to my life and its doubt for this choice I have made.

When it's suddenly clear that my path is my own and it sets them both free to choose theirs.

This Summer

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...I ate my fill of juicy, red strawberries; tart, plump blueberries; tomatoes bursting with ripeness; divinely pungent basil; and crisp, buttery corn-on-the cob.

...I wrote for myself in a long-lost journal, an effort to come to terms with who I want to be in this new environment, and rediscovered the importance of connecting with myself away from the public eye.

...I listened to the shrill cadence of cicadas, their urgent trill a backdrop I became glad to expect.

...I walked in the woods and strolled on the beach and marveled, marveled, at the new horizons to which I now have access.

...I supported local farmers, the winery across the street, and the only beef I ate came from grass-fed happy cows from my very own county.

...I dreamed of my daughters and ached for them, their physical presence in my life a void I struggle with daily.

...I prepared for my first hurricane, got nothing but a tropical storm, and was ultimately relieved that we got nothing but a tropical storm.

...I found a reasonable and appropriate rhythm to my work that has heretofore eluded me.

...I have come closer to living a balanced life than I ever have before, and am in complete and utter awe at how much time and effort it takes to live a balanced life.

...I recognized an important shift. Instead of uttering the oft-repeated phrase, I can't believe we live here, just yesterday I caught myself saying, We live here. Subtle, but discernibly different in its expression of  permanence.

Hello, August

tinywhitedaisies

You are a signal. A nudge.

A harbinger of urgency.

You beckon, Quick! Before it all slips away!

You arrive, and suddenly, the days that drip with sunshine are numbered.

And yet, summer's pull, that enticement that urges me to languish in time as the days lengthen, warm, and swell with a certain nectar of loveliness--seems to become more and more elusive as the years wax on. I am lost in my work, keen to fulfill my duties, programmed to stay on task.

And yet, I do feel the draw, the compulsion to heed August's warning. For in it, she reminds me:

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...that summer used to mean wiling away the hours climbing the stories-tall pine tree at the side of the house, searching for the end of the world at the top of the branches, being mindful of the pine sap in every step, challenging myself to go two, maybe three branches farther than I did the day before, until my mama calls me in for tuna fish sandwiches, some cold grapes, potato chips, and graham crackers filled with vanilla frosting--chocolate if I'm really lucky.

 

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...that summer used to mean long, hot days at the neighborhood pool. Diving for stuff. Playing trolls. Daring each other to jump off the high dive. Sharing a Dreamsicle afterwards. Eating it in the viewing stands up top, everything echoing, the noisy pool sounds warbling in our plugged-up ears, distorted and clangy. Halos around everything we look at with our itchy burning bloodshot red eyes, thinking, goggles are for sissies.

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...that summer used to mean staying up late watching Johnny Carson with my dad. Popping popcorn and adding too much butter but just enough salt. Making Kool-Aid. Opening the windows wide in the hopes of a breeze. In the discernible background, the creek rushes by, there is a symphony of crickets, and big bugs crash against the front French windows in search of light. There is also laughter, and the knowledge that love is more true here than in extraordinary events.

 

Etsy

...that summer used to mean campfires and marshmallows, book-reading marathons, and amusement park rides.

 

Etsy

...band camps and drive-ins and night games with friends.

Etsy

And even now, as the Dog Day's moon makes her way back to full, and those carefree days seem ever longer ago, I make August's list in an effort to capture a hint of that young, fun-loving girl:

• Pick blueberries until my fingers are purple
• Bake a pie, a buckle, and a crisp
• Visit the ocean, at least one more time
• Explore Boston for a day, or maybe even a weekend
• Read two more books
• Eat more lobster
• Pay my respects to Robert Frost
• Eat fresh basil and ripe, home-grown tomatoes until they're growing out of my ears

Perhaps the activities have changed over the years, and perhaps I often feel too busy to truly savor the magic that is summer, but August is calling me, and I best not keep her waiting.

How 'bout you? What are your must-do's this August, and what did summer used to mean to you?

She

...is in the air, on her way to me.

I feel an anticipatory thrill as I contemplate our reunion embrace, a tug of devotion so deep it's like she's being handed to me for the first time all over again.

Knowing that the yearning I've felt over the last few months will melt away in that instant.

Like a child at Christmas, I am eager. Seven days to revel in our togetherness, and it's all ahead.

What was once so commonplace is now so rare...

 

...and therefore so much more appreciated.

 

I'm In My Element

 
Is there nothing so wonderful as catching up on your Google Reader in the hotel room the night before a trade show with a cuppa decaf non-fat mocha by your side, knowing that the happy reunion with your bestie is just minutes away?

I'm in my element, and ever grateful for the opportunity once again.

Some Days

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...I am so lonely, I wonder:

 Whatever on earth possessed us to think that we could move 2,500 miles away from everything that we knew...

...and be fine?

Sweet Sixteen

I went to the ocean.

Drew in its salty air, its scent like a portal to birth.

Slept soundly in crisp, white sheets and woke early, bathed in sunshine.

Steeped my feet in the sand and scuffed them, like an emery board on winter.

Lost myself in the past and hoped for the future.

All while savoring the intense goodness of this man:

...as we celebrated our journey, now sixteen years long.

Re-born and rife with untold potential in this new landscape.

Every kiss a promise. Each day a gift.

 

It's been a very sweet sixteen.

The Downside to Hilltop Living?

We woke to a misty morning, something we are learning is very common for us here in what I affectionately call "the Shire." We live at the top of a hill, and if it is raining, or humid with a high dewpoint, we are often shrouded in fog. And while it is beautiful, and I fancy myself living in the middle of a Thomas Hardy novel as the mist envelops us, it is definitely the downside of hilltop living.

But these pretties don't mind it:

...and it makes for some extremely productive days at the office:

After all, it's quite something for this high mountain desert rat to adapt to this rainy climate so reminiscent of the settings I have loved so well in my beloved Victorian British novels. But when I consider that it is the steadfast yearning for such bucolic landscapes that has helped draw me here in the first place, I'm pretty sure I'm up to the challenge.