LIGHTING THE WAY

We live a fair bit out of the way to be a part of anyone’s twinkle tour.  Houses in rural Saskatchewan are getting further and further apart – there are fewer farmers farming much more land than was the norm a couple of decades ago.  And, it’s not uncommon for them to decide to live in town, as well.  It makes for a feeling of privacy, tranquility, and peace for those of us who choose the country life.

But, when I put up my outdoor Christmas lights, I know very few people are going to see them.

It doesn’t deter me though.  I have grandchildren who think they are pretty and they spend a fair amount of time here over the holidays; I do it for them.

And me.  I also do it for me.

I began, years ago, with a fifteen foot blue spruce just east of the house.  What’s the point of having a Christmas tree and not decorate it, after all?  At first it took two strings of lights, and then three.  I am now up to four strings and that doesn’t take the lights to the top by any means.  But it’s as far as anyone can go without a picker truck.  Sadly, I do not possess a picker truck.

This year I went ahead and bought light string number five before I was forced to accept my lack of picker truck capabilities.  It took me a cup of tea and a half hour of contemplation before I decided that this was an opportunity, not a set back, and went back out to devise an optical illusion Christmas tree down by the well.  Not only did a single string of lights create a tree, this one could be seen without having to leave the house.  I’m pretty pleased with the way it turned out.

But, the yard looked unfinished so off I went to town and bought another string of lights for my little Amur maple tree.  To look at the actual bulbs on this string is misleading.  They are tiny, insignificant things but the light they put out is amazing; the colours dazzling.  And, even better, this tree is almost right out in front of the house.  It lights up the whole front yard.  It also lights up my smile as I do the dishes after supper – out there, twinkling in the dark, the wind giving it movement and extra sparkle.

There is also the indoor Christmas tree.  I still buy a real one every year, refusing to think about the money I throw away every January.  I love the smell of the real ones.  The prelit artificial ones just don’t have the rich, bright colours I like to use.  This time of year has too many hours of darkness; I need all the light and colour I can get!

As much as I love all of my trees, though, it’s the laser lights that have never worked properly since I first brought them home that I love the most.  They were the first generation of the laser option and I paid crazy money for them because my whole family was going to be home that year and I wanted the best of everything.  These things are designed to be installed outside and aimed at the house, projecting a light show of moving lights or shapes across the building’s walls.  Mine refuse to move, or blink, or do anything but shine.

From the outside this is a disappointment.  When the plan was for dancing lights and changing colours and all I got was pin points of red and green in a static grid pattern, I felt gypped.   But, life went on and our house filled to bursting, and over that crazy, dizzy, noisy holiday I grew to love that my interior walls and ceilings were decorated in Christmas coloured dots of light.  They acted as decorations, as night lights, as red and green freckles on anyone standing in their beams.  They have never worked properly but I wouldn’t dream of not putting them up every single year.  They stir the memories of that 2014 Christmas every time I see them.

A few of their beams even make into our bedroom and shimmer across the stippled ceiling.  I don’t know why but the laser beams that are sharp and clear in the air out side but once through the window glass are refracted in a way that make the lights look like lace when they hit the wall.  It’s the last thing I see before I fall asleep and the first thing I see in the morning.

One of my favorite things to do this time of the year is to take a twinkle tour drive to see what people do to decorate, and I welcome everyone to come see mine if they want, but unless you come inside for a cup of cheer you’ll never see the ones I love the best.

UNFINISHED BUSINESS

2019 is rolling downhill like a great big snowball.  There’s no stopping it, or even slowing it down.  The best I can hope for is to stay out of its direct path while I scramble through the remaining days trying to get things done.

This being retired business that I’m in is kind of misleading.  Yes, I can and do call my time my own, but also yes, this precious time is sometimes spent puttering around my gardens and playing with grandchildren.  This is not ‘wasting’ time, it is the perfect way to refresh my soul, but even people with refreshed souls need to get a few things accomplished from day to day.

Oh sure the meals get made, the laundry gets done and it’s a very rare bill that doesn’t get paid on time.  The outside summer work gets done because I love to be out there doing it and writing is usually up to date because, again, it’s the kind of thing I enjoy.  Where I fail usually has to do with numbers, books, accounts, and paperwork of any kind.  Let me play with words all day long ... make the numbers go away.

With less than two weeks before Christmas and three before we swap out our calendars for the bright new shiny unscribbled on ones, I have a fair amount on my plate already.  I am hosting the family feast so there is a menu to plan, phone calls to make, baking to do, and extra house cleaning to tackle.  It’s really embarrassing when you know Santa was here because he left his autograph in the dust on your furniture.  And wouldn’t it be nice if the windows were clean enough to let the sun shine through?

But, before I tackle cleaning I should get the decorating out of the way.  The tree is bought but not yet thawed out or set up.  The tubs of garland and tinsel, baubles and lights are awaiting their annual moment to shine.  It’s time to turn on the Christmas music or the ‘too sweet for my teeth’ Hallmark movie channel, and get in the groove.

As of this morning I have several dozen tarts of many kinds all baked – and due to extreme will power, not all eaten – and the gifts have all been wrapped and hidden because there are grandkids coming for a sleepover tomorrow.  The tree is my weekend project.

That’s what I started doing last night - tidying up so that I could begin decorating.  I cleaned up the pile of papers on the desk in my tv room – and found a stack of paperwork to claim 2019 health benefits before the end of the year.  I sorted through the stack of too-important-to-throw-away papers on top of the china cabinet and found a project I was working on for Tourism that I had forgotten all about.  Thank goodness the deadline is still a month off!  Chastising myself for being so unorganized I carefully stacked these two jobs out to my computer desk in the office and placed them with a couple other coupon redemption jobs that have to be completed online.  To top it off I received an email requiring me to put together an application for grant money, I must double check the deadline on that ...

 Even as I sit here, happily tapping away on my keyboard this stack of nuisance papers mock and intimidate me.  I wonder, if I poured gravy on them, would the dog eat my homework?

Merry Christmas everyone – lets all hope for a quiet, relaxing January!

CALENDAR CRUNCH

It must be almost December.  Things are beginning to pile up around me and I find myself slipping into denial about how much time I have left before I need to cook a turkey.

My Face book memories reminded me the other day that a few years ago I had all the shopping/cards/decorating done and it wasn’t even the end of November yet.  I was a little shocked at this, even to the point of checking to make sure I was on the right page.  I didn’t think I had ever been that far ahead of the game – and if I had, wouldn’t I have remembered it?  But, the page was mine, the post was backed up by comments from trustworthy people I actually know, it looked legit.  I still half think it was fake news.  I didn’t think it was possible I could be early ready for Christmas.

Then again, they do talk of such things as Christmas miracles. 

It’s not looking too much like I’m getting another one in 2019.

It’s not that I have nothing done.  I have a few gifts bought.  Well, more like partly bought.  I have half of what I want to give to a few people, all squirreled away in various closets and cupboards, plus a bag I just remembered in the back of my car.  One gift has already been delivered and is in use, two more are going to be delivered closer to the big day, and the gifts that have to go the farthest (Australia) are not even a solid plan in my head yet.  I’m going to regret that one, I can tell you.

What I really need is to clearly write this information down in list form so I can see where the empty blanks still are.  I might be pleasantly surprised that I’m further ahead than I think.

The one thing that I actually have all done is my Christmas letter.  Well, the writing it part is done.  I still have to buy the Christmassy paper to print it on, get the copies made, and address all the envelopes to the folks who get a paper letter.  Because I send so many I have switched to email for anyone whose address I know – so much quicker to send ... except that this year I lost all my contacts info and have to start from scratch.  On second thought, even the thing I thought I was done, I am not done.  That’s depressing.

Yesterday, since the ladder was up at the house because we were changing light bulbs in the porch, I sent my husband up to the attic to retrieve the Christmas lights and decorations.  This is a good thing, right?  Now I can get busy decorating whenever I feel like it.  I no longer have the excuse that the decorations are out of reach.  I realize now how much I was relying on that excuse.  Now I have four large tubs of tinsel, baubles and lights taking up all kinds of space in my TV room.  A smart person would decorate immediately and store the tubs in the basement.  A smart, energetic person.  I’m not sure I qualify on either count there, but I do recognize what is necessary.  It’s a start.

With all this talk of other holiday activities one must also face the biggy – Christmas baking.  The grocery stores all have baking ingredients on sale – they know it’s time.  My Face book friends are starting to post pictures of all the goodies they are brewing up in their kitchens – they know it’s time.  It’s the time of year for bake sales – they know it’s time.  The thing that I know is that if I start baking now it will all be eaten and I will have to do it all again in a couple weeks.  I’m going to save all kinds of work and reduce my caloric intake by the thousands and only make butter tarts once.  I’m crafty like that.

And then there will only be one more thing before the turkey goes into the oven.  Some quiet Sunday afternoon I will haul all my treasures out, gather paper and scissors and tape together, and wrap up Christmas.  Nothing is ever done until the paperwork is done, right?

And that will remind me it is almost January and that the paperwork of tax time is waiting for me next.

IN DENIAL

There is no ignoring the progression of the days.  Granted, the weather has warmed up this week so we’re dealing with fog and rain instead of snow and ice, but the calendar still says we are past mid November.  This forces me to face the following unalienable truths:

1.       The Christmas shopping cannot be put off any forever

2.       I have already received my first Christmas letter (it was a late 2018 one, but still)

3.       Since I’m staging the family feast this year the baking should commence sooner rather than later

4.       And did I mention the Christmas shopping thing?

I’ve been trying to get my head around it.  With pen and paper I have written down a Christmas gift list.  Well, to be completely honest, only half a list.  I have done the side with the names on it.  The side with gift ideas needs work ... a lot of work.  And sadly, there’s every chance that I will discover that the name side isn’t complete either.

Armed with this flimsy outline of what I need, I have wandered around a few stores and found nothing to inspire me.  I’m not blaming the stores, mind you, they had lots of things to choose from – I just am not a natural born shopper.  It’s a rare day when I am actually in the mood for browsing/shopping/spending money.  I think the last time it happened was in 1999.

Also I am not the kind of mom or grandma that thinks the spirit of Christmas is shown in large, lavish gifts.  I’m into giving pyjamas and books and maybe one little fun thing to do like a puzzle or game.  It seems pathetic that even with the bar set so low I still can’t seem to motivate myself to get the job done.  It’s times like this when I fantasize about being the little kid and my greatest Christmas dilemma was that I would be expected to ‘at least try’ the Christmas pudding, and then wait six more eons before the dishes were done and we could open our presents.  Ah!  Those were the days.

But, meanwhile back in the real world, I have to think of and then find small, light weight, Canadian themed gifts for the Australian family.  As usual they will have to be sent airmail which costs more than the gifts will, but that is totally my fault – the cost of procrastination.

Next I have to figure out what sizes all the Canadian grandchildren are, go to where children’s pyjamas are sold, and choose wisely so that everyone is happy with whatever superhero/dinosaur/animal/robot that they get.  No pressure. 

Likewise with the book store choices, but there is a hidden pitfall with me and book stores ... I go in and may never find my way back out again.  If they served Timmie’s coffee instead of Starbucks I would only re-emerge in spring and from there would migrate straight to a plant nursery and disappear for at least another month.  These are two places where I can spend all kinds of time and money.  Unfortunately this does not help me with Christmas shopping. 

I play with the idea of running away from home.

 

I’ve considered gluing November’s calendar page to December’s.

Conversely, I might put up a 2020 calendar, starting the year at February.

Are there specific vitamins a person can take to get them through a shopping day?

Could a hypnotherapist put me in a ‘you love to shop’ trance?

Or, do I just have to do this the old fashioned way?  

THE GENIUS’S WIFE

For everything there is a season for every activity under the sun ...

I was thinking of this bible verse (or the song Turn, turn, Turn by the Byrds in the 60’s) the other day as I tackled yet another of my seasonal jobs.  The seasons roll along and those of us with yards and gardens roll along with them.  We know all about ‘a time to sow and a time to reap’, ‘a time to kill (potato bugs) and a time to heal (the apple trees the deer ate)’, and depending on the whims of Mother Nature we also are well acquainted with ‘a time to weep and a time to laugh’.

This year I even took my yard beautification a step further and installed a rock border/pathway around a large new flower bed I had started.  It took me one complete season ... gathering the stones together, keeping the ones shaped properly for the job and throwing away the rest.   For sure Ecclesiastes chapter 3 verses 1-8 do a good job of describing a gardener’s life cycle.

But, even after the last of the deck pots have been stored away and the squirrels have been gifted with the rest of the sunflower heads, there is still more to do.  It’s a smart girl who gets out there before it’s too cold and the ground is all slippery with ice and snow and gets her Christmas lights up.  I have found that it’s much less treacherous standing on metal ladder rungs while wearing dry shoes, as opposed to snow covered boots.  I much prefer stringing lights through the branches of a twenty foot blue spruce on a sunny day in October.  They don’t have to be plugged in until December 1, but the hard part is already done.

Well, except if someone actually put the lights up the wrong way (Who even knew there was a wrong way?!!!!) and ended up with the male end of the light string AT THE TOP OF THE TREE.

But that’s a story for another day.

Thankfully, with age comes wisdom.  Every year I take away a little new knowledge of this job.  I know that when I can’t reach any higher I can gain four more feet by using the fork end of a wiener roasting stick.  Then I use a short step ladder plus the forked stick.  Then I affix a two prong attachment to the end of a telescoping pole meant for clearing snow off the roof and use that.  We do own a taller step ladder but that just doesn’t seem like a good idea with sixty year old bones and frozen ground.  This is the age/wisdom thing kicking in.

When it came time to get the lights out from storage this fall I found evidence of more wisdom.  One of the strings had come off the tree damaged last spring.  I had actually had the presence of mind to set it apart from the others, identify the broken wire, and show it to my husband to see if it could be fixed.  I vaguely recall the conversation ....

Me: See how the wire is pulled out of the socket? Could you fix that?

Him: I can fix anything.  I am a genius.

I did not argue this point; he has some pretty impressive fixing skills.  But also he is good at procrastination and I wanted to put the Christmas clutter away.  The wisdom I want to brag about here is that I had the presence of mind to stick a label on the broken end so I would remember it needed attention before it was already installed in the tree.  The label said “The genius said he would fix this in the fall.”

This fall, when I showed him the note he calmly looked at it and said “They are on sale at the Coop.  Go buy a new one.”  That’s not his normal kind of fixing genius.

I did go buy more, but there is too much Scottish blood in my veins to just throw something away.  With nothing to lose I thought to myself “let’s see what a genius’s wife can do.” 

You know ... There is a time to tear apart, and a time to mend together ...

So far, so good.  The fix involved what I had on hand; Gorilla glue and Gorilla tape.  If I can manage to place the weak spot with enough slack so that the wind can’t pull it tight I think it’s good to go.  Meanwhile I have a whole new set of lights, I may need another extension cord.

MAKING IT COUNT

“They” say that to keep your brain in tip top shape you need to keep challenging it with new stuff.  I consider this good advice and am the kind of person who reads thought provoking books, pays attention to world affairs, and loves to go places and do things.  By these ‘keep it active’ standards of healthy brains mine should be in top notch shape, but lately I’m not so sure.

I forget why I walked into a room.  I get lost in the middle of a sentence.  I can’t find my car in a parking lot.  I can’t keep my kids’ names straight.

Okay.  Okay.  I’ve had trouble with all of these things for decades, but now that I’m in my early sixties they are a bit more worrying.  I’ve always said that all I need is a few more gigabytes of memory installed and I’ll be fine, but the joke is not ringing as funny as it used to.

At any rate, when I was asked if I would like to be a Deputy Returning Officer for the election, I said yes.  I would be learning new things, serving my community, and experiencing the electoral process from the other side of the table.  Not only would I receive a pay check for the day, but think of all the exercise my poor, flabby brain cells were going to get out of it!  I signed up with a bunch of other local folks for this new adventure.

 We began with training a few days before the big day.  I use the term ‘training’ loosely here because the instructor who showed up presented us with everything we would need on Election Day but did a very poor job of telling us what we were going to do with it.  Thank goodness the workbooks we were given did detail the duties very well, but if her job was to instill confidence in the trainees she missed the mark.  I’ve attended countless training sessions over my work life; the last thing attendees are asked to do is fill out a feedback sheet on the trainer and material.  This was one time I really had an opinion to state and there was no opportunity to give one.

Regardless, Monday October 21 dawned and we made our way to our polling stations.  Actually, we were there well before the dawn happened.  In order for the polls to open at 7:30 we had to be setting up by 6:30, and in order for that to happen I had to be up at 5:30.  My poor, flabby brain cells were already in a state of shock.

The many many forms and lists and information and materials we needed were stored in the ballot box so that had to be unsealed, emptied, double checked, and resealed.  Our table was arranged as per the guide’s instructions, the signage was set up, the voter’s screen positioned, and finally our CPS was called over to inspect that we had done it right.  At 7:30 the doors opened and we were in business.

Each polling station was staffed with a DRO and a polling clerk.  There were times when two people didn’t seem like enough, but there were also stretches of time when we only had a half dozen voters per hour.  It didn’t take long to get into the rhythym of duties, but just when we thought we had it under control some offbeat circumstance would pop up and we would have to fill out a correction form to change an address or a registration for someone who didn’t appear on the voter’s list. 

It wasn’t hard work.  But it was long work.

On the whole it was a good day.  We had organized a pot luck lunch approach to feeding ourselves – there was soup and buns, taco salad, carrot sticks, and muffins and cookies plus a big pot of coffee to keep us going.  I was surprised by when the busiest times were – 9:00 to 11:00 being the craziest, and then the noon hour being almost empty.  The afternoon lagged long and gave us lots of time to bond with our co-workers before it picked up again with the crowd who had chosen to vote after work.  The last couple hours before the polls closed were the longest – slow traffic and now exhausted, poor, flabby brain cells to work with.

Still, the approaching magic hour of closing and counting was a little intimidating.  We had mastered the voting part – each voter had taken care of their end of it.  Now it was up to us to make sure that those votes were counted and recorded correctly.  I told my poor, flabby brain cells that we were in the home stretch, and promised them I wouldn’t do anything strenuous to them for at least a week.  (I lied, of course, it’s only been two days and here I am at my computer, writing.)

One step at a time we balanced the number of voters with the number of ballots used, and when we were sure there was nothing missing we set up for the count.  That went very well too so we recorded our results and gave them to the CPS who phoned them in to Elections Canada. 

My brain cells were all limping for the EXIT door by this time but the night wasn’t over yet.  The backup paperwork had to be filled in and filed, then sorted and sealed, initialed and consolidated with the other polls to be returned to Elections Canada the next day.  Elvis left the building at 10:00.

I had put in a 15 ½ day for the election and yet had to ask my husband how it had turned out when I got home.  The results weren’t what I would have chosen but I was too tired to care.  I took my poor, flabby brain cells to bed.

They had their revenge though; it took them at least another hour to settle down so I could go to sleep.  And they’ve been whinging and moaning about their sore, aching muscles ever since.

Obviously I need to push them harder.  No wonder I can’t keep my kids’ names straight.

CALL OF HARVEST DUTY

“What are you doing?” 

The question was asked by the tired voice of my husband over the phone at 5:30 on Wednesday.  He needed help.  Well, actually, he needed fuel ... in a grain truck ... so he could empty his combine hopper and carry on combining.  Could I please head up the road till I found the truck driver who had put too much faith in his fuel gauge, pick him up and run him back to the half ton with the fuel tank on it?  Please?  Every minute that they couldn’t get on with the harvest was a crisis; Mother Nature is not being kind this year.

There’s no saying ‘no’ to a request like that.  I had spent all day outside finishing up my own kind of harvest.  After the better part of three weeks spent away I had come home to gardens that needed cleaned up, deck planters to put away, and bulbs to plant.  I ached everywhere and the cold I had been fighting for the past week had evolved into an exhausting cough.  I really hadn’t planned on leaving the house again that day, but oh well, this sounded like an easy enough mission.

I turned off the burner on the stove, threw on a jacket, wrapped the old denim blanket around the passenger seat and off I went.  I found the neighbour’s new hired man right where I was told he would be, dropped him off at the fuel truck and headed home again.

The weather had been glorious all day; sun shining, the breeze strong enough to dry but not so crazy to cause trouble.  The sun was at the perfect angle to show off the brilliant yellows and oranges of the fall leaves.  I only had my phone for a camera so I didn’t stop to take any pictures knowing that I couldn’t do the scenery justice – I would just commit it to memory instead.  I was hungry and supper wasn’t cooking itself.

“What are you doing now?”  The same tired voice over the same phone twenty minutes later.

Well, by this time I had heated the hamburger back up, browned it, and was about to pour the water and milk in to produce the simplest thing I could think of for supper ... Hamburger Helper.  If he had called even 30 seconds later the noodles would have devolved to goo while I was gone on my next big adventure.  I reached over, turned off the stove again, and asked what the new mission would be.

They had finished that field and needed to move up north to the next one.  There were three combines, a tractor and grain tank, a grain truck, and a tractor and auger to move but only 4 men to get the job done ... and time was a wasting.  Could I please follow Paul in the tractor up to the new location and bring him back to pick up his combine? 

This time I actually asked if it was okay if I did this in my pyjamas.  He laughed a little and said he didn’t think anyone was going to care.  I agreed.  Josh hadn’t said anything on mission #1.

That’s the kind of thing you get away with as a farm wife.  I had come in from my very strenuous day, taken a shower, and decided that 5:00 was a perfectly acceptable time to put pyjamas on.  The chances of seeing another soul for the rest of the day are next to nothing when you live seven miles from town ... well except for the days that you do.

Once again I pulled on my jacket, slipped into my Uggs, and hit the road.  If I had listened to that little warning voice in my head I would have made myself a ham sandwich too.  Mission #2 took way longer. 

First there was the very slow trip up behind the tractor.  This time I did stop and take pictures of the fall colours – there was lots of time.  Then back to pick up the combine, where my mission was extended to taking Josh back to the grain truck and leading him up to the new field because he had never been there before.  I really should have seen this coming; of course it was going to involve multiple trips.  While I waited for him I started searching the car for sustenance.  I found an almost empty package of breath mints in the glove box.  It kept me alive.  I offered a few to Josh but he said he just knew that he would eventually work his way back to the vehicle he had left his lunch kit in.

There was another round trip to get him back to pick up the tractor and auger.  My breath mints were long gone, it was way after dark, and I still hadn’t cooked supper.

But at least my day was done.  The men went until 3:30 for the second night in a row.  All I had to do was finish my lazy man’s supper and go to bed ... and I was already dressed for that.