The Twelve Days of Christmas: The Eighth Day

I woke up at three in the morning and lay there worrying about life, school and all the things I hadn't done over break.  Silly thing to do: lying in bed and fretting.  After half an hour of this and feeling more miserable with every minute, I decided DO something: go my classroom for a few hours today to check it over and just make things a bit more welcoming for the students and myself come Monday morning.  With that settled, I got up to feed the cats, made coffee and brought a cup back to bed with me.   There I relaxed and read my book with Arby cuddled next to me.

The classroom was still, dark and cold when Bruce dropped me off at school around noon (we had a sushi lunch beforehand, so I was well-fortified).  He left to get a haircut and I marched over to Room 7 and walked through the door to my "teacher" life.  The plants in the window looked droopy and sad and one very possibly had withered away.  I switched on the heat and, then watered all the plants (the one that looked dead actually seemed to have a bit of life right at its base after all).  I threw away last year's calendars and put up a colorful new one:  photographs of horses.  Then my friend Sally stopped by with a bag of oranges.  It was so good to see her and just chat for a little while -- that is the blessing of a friend.  After she left, I changed one of my bulletin boards.  And that was all I did -- it wasn't much, but it was enough.  I left the heat on very low so the room would be warm on Monday morning when I came in from yard duty.

Bruce came to pick me up and we decided to drive the long way home, along the Stanislaus River.  It was the only sight-seeing journey I made over the last two weeks, but I enjoyed gazing out at the landscape of water, trees, cows, egrets, clouds and houses.  On reflection, observing the world rolling past as I looked out the window was a lot like lying in bed with my coffee while reading A Circle of Quiet.

There was a point during these winter days at home when I was acutely disappointed by their dullness and sameness.  I also felt guilty for not wishing to celebrate Christmas this year.  Yet I lacked the energy or will to do more than just rest and be still.  So that's what I did.  And, without consciously realizing it,  I  built the space to begin coming to terms with the sorrow of Becky's passing.  In the process, I've begun to appreciate again the sorts of things that I love:  books, music, fire glowing in the woodstove, birds on the feeders, ice on the pond, some lovely rain storms, pruning trees,  warming my hands at the burn pile, Scrabble in the evenings with the love of my life...

 Oh, and of course, coffee in bed.