pack animals

People blog to put their voice out there. Their unique voice, telling a unique story, like no other. At the same time that they (we) spend so much of the year imitating the behaviors of others. Rituals and traditions, we say, as we scrape the same cookie off the sheet that someone else (and another and another) had scraped off just a few blocks (generations?) down.

If you looked at my day, you’d see all the markers of sameness. I hurried and made lists and made my way through crowded parking lots. Secrets, packed away in a back seat, or the trunk of a car.



And yes, I did my annual Christmas trip to the mall. It wasn’t even extraordinarily crowded, but it is such a boring thing to do at any other time and not so boring at all in these last days before the 25th.



Driving back, I passed the evocative stand, at the side of the gas station.



All gone. Or, almost all gone.

At home, the lights are on, the ornaments (yes, with a handful from Poland) are better than wonderful.



Pre-holiday silliness. Copied, with minor, individual twists and turns. But the magic is in the repetition, imitation. I did it all last year and, with luck, will get to do it all over again next year and the year after. Like others before me, next door to me, ahead of me.