Each day is shorter, each night is longer. The last few days have been gray and cold. We are in Geneva as we close out November and get ready for December.
We are also getting ready to go to Argelès, where Rick and I have celebrated Christmas/Solstice for the past ten years, with the exception of the year with my daughter in Boston.
I have the Auer black chocolates for the calendar with its little boxes, selected one by one from the rows of squares at their chocolaterie. I have the book that I will give to Rick to read Christmas Eve in the Icelandic tradition. He just told me the Icelandic people often drink hot chocolate. We can borrow that tradition too.
This year I have no idea what to give my husband. Some years it was easy, an antique wooden statue of William Tell, a painting he admired that I told him was too expensive and bought immediately after he left the gallery.
Our tree is waiting at our favorite florist, a tiny one for a table. We don't want Sherlock to think we've given him an indoor toilet with a floor tree.
The village will turn into fairy land with white lights already strung across all the streets. The Christmas market will have the ducks, rabbits and ponies. Children will visit Père Noël.
As
the days grow shorter, I've celebrated each day in the warmth and
coziness of my home. The celebration is just an inner feeling of pure
happiness and peace.
For me, the most important part of the season is the solstice. I must have a bit of a real tree in my home. If I was with people who have an artificial tree, a branch, no matter how small, will do.
That bit of a tree represents the return of the light, moving toward the hope of the new year and all it will hold.
The solstice has existed from the beginning of the planet. Humans, new comers to the planet, have marked it as evidenced by archeological finds, arrangement of stones which reflect the light. There are variations of celebrations all over the modern world too, of which Christmas is just one. I can do no less.
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