home for the holidays

Happy New Year!

1. Cross-country skiing this morning, alone, in the sunshine. It's always a bit of a thrill to ski down the street (the street! where people drive!) to the park, and today was a beautiful, perfect day for a jaunt. The sun was out and sparkling on the snow, which was hardly touched. I thought again of Hobbes and his big white sheet of paper as my skis cut a track across smooth fields and along wooded paths. I saw very few people - a few dog-walkers and a car or two - and really felt almost alone in the whole wonderful world. As I shuffled along the path overlooking the big brown river, bells chimed the hour from a church across the gorge. When I reached the pond, I found it frozen over except for a small dark spot at one end, which was full of mallards quacking at each other and splashing in the icy water. Nearby, a flock of seagulls all sat on the ice in a clump, all facing southeast, a trail of seagull footprints leading from the hole in the ice. I stood and watched the birds for a while, feeling grateful to have another kind of home than an ice-cold pond. When I grew cold enough that I had to re-zip my jacket, I turned and headed back to that home through the wonderful white.

2. My neighbor's cheerful greeting on my return, and his obvious good mood even though he was shoveling his driveway again. It's that kind of beautiful day. And he's that kind of happy guy. He's lived next door since I was four or five, and has been a fantastic friend and neighbor for all those years. I was lucky to have such great neighbors growing up.

3. A very late lunch of dim sum with my mother... crispy scallion pancakes, salty edamame, gooey crab rangoon, springy spring rolls. Most of the restaurants in town are closed for New Year's Day, but not this one! When the waitress brought the check, she also brought one of those roll-up wall calendars, with a cartoony bovine to let us know that 2009 is the year of the ox.

4. I had coffee with a college friend who now lives in Japan, teaching English to high school students. I don't think I'd seen her since she graduated almost three years ago, but we chatted away in the Barnes & Nobel cafe (sadly, awesome independent coffee shops are also closed for the holiday) as though nowhere near that time had passed. It was great to see her and to hear about teaching in a very different setting. And, so sweetly of her...

5. ...she brought me a present from Japan: Moomin trinkets! Stickers of Moomintroll and Snufkin, a pencil case bedecked with Little My, and, incredibly, Moomintroll chopsticks! I was speechless. I have loved these books since childhood, though they are not at all well-known in the US. It is in their native Finland and in Japan that the characters were popularly received. When I was in Finland I bought many Moomin items... but I never saw chopsticks!

6. Finally watching Little Miss Sunshine. I now agree with all the people who recommended it to me. It was great.

7. The lights on the Christmas tree, blinking and sparkling. I love to sit on the sofa this time of year and watch the patterns the lights make on the ceiling, pink and green and blue. The long needles of the white pine make fantastic shadows, and the lights glint on all the ornaments that we have collected over the years. Those ornaments feel like old friends; so many call up stories and memories. There is no place like home.