Christmas Eve

First, a memory. Maybe in it there lies a story about the holidays. Maybe about youthful immaturity. In any case, it's a story that I left out of my book Like a Swallow. After all these years, I'm still not sure what to make of it.

I was twelve, living in New York because of my father's appointment to the Untied Nations. Just around Christmas time, a Polish Boys choir (Poznanskie Slowiki) came to sing in New York.  The whole choir was invited then to a party at the Polish UN Delegation and I guess they thought the boys would enjoy the company of ones their own age because my sister and I were invited to participate. It was, to the best of my recollection, a fun event. And I connected with one of the boys from the choir. Czarek was his name. I was quite the brazen kid back then (well, maybe not only back then...) and so I gave him my address and told him -- write to me! Mind you, I was just twelve.

He did write. Incredible letters. Soulful, full of insights and feeling. (He was maybe two years older than me, but still, imagine -- all this from a 14 year old boy.)

We corresponded intensely that year, and, too once I returned to Poland (a year later). Of course, once in Poland, I was but a train ride away. Eventually he asked to see me again. In Warsaw. He came up with a friend (he was shy and I'm sure needed the support of someone from his own world) and the three of us spend an afternoon together. It all ended then. I never saw him again. Never responded to any more of his letters.

Why? Because at the plum ripe age of 14, I was in love with a boy in my class (amply documented in LaS) and because Czarek wasn't a Warsaw boy. At that age, I could not see beyond my immediate environment. This is a frightening thought -- that you could be so narrow minded -- but it's true. My world was my school, my class, my group of high school friends. Czarek didn't fit well in that world.

Over the years, I've thought a lot about this episode in my life. It's so easy to trap yourself in your own closed off circle of friends and acquaintances. Maybe this is why I eventually felt that it would be wise to leave that world and to try something new. Maybe I spooked myself with my dismissal of Czarek. 

I listened to the Polish carols as sung by the Slowiki today. It's Christmas Eve after all. 

I also listened to the King's College Festival of Nine Lessons and Carols earlier this morning. Another boy's choir that shook me up, though at a later stage in life and not so much at a personal level. My ex had research to do in Cambridge and I went along for the ride. (Actually I was supposed to be working on my own dissertation, but I did none of that. I explored Cambridge instead.) 

In those days we all listened to music on vinyl. While in England I purchased several albums of various college choirs singing Christmas songs. Clare, King's, St. John's. These became my favorite holiday music to listen to for years to come. My daughters will attest to the fact that we listened to them a lot!

Much later, a friend, a musician who played stuff with quite a different vibe, asked me what my favorite songs were. I mentioned the choir music from Cambridge. I think she nearly fell off her chair. I mean, choral? From Cambridge? That's just weird.

But it wasn't weird. There was something enduring in the music. It stayed with me even in turbulent times.  A safe harbor of sorts. A spiritual escape.

For a person who didn't really have a lot of Christmas in her childhood, I surely have had a lot of very meaningful Christmas imagery that has stayed with me. And music. Traditional stuff. Very different than the jazzy numbers I like to listen to today. 

I'm thinking that I have a very complicated relationship to the holidays!

I used to say to my kids that the morning of Christmas Eve was the best. Most of the work is done. You have before you all the glory of family time, of shared foods, of kids' delights, of friends' messages. You're about to step into that magic space of good will and kind gestures. Of laughter. How perfectly sublime to be at the cusp of it all! 

So, yeah, I like this day, this morning a lot. 

It's cold of course. You know that already. But the winds are calming down a bit and the sun is out. We'll be lifting ourselves up from the Arctic blast soon. Hope is with us here, in south-central Wisconsin.

I have brief errands. Fun stuff. I need to pick up the Christmas Eve cake at Batch Bakery for tonight's dinner. The kids would like the chocolate peppermint candy cake, so I ordered one for them. (this one)

Too, I need to get a fresh loaf of bread for tonight's dinner. (So long as I'm there, I pick up some Venoiseries for breakfast...)

I'm happy to see a line form for the breads. The loaves are in high demand! Just as if we were in France, or Poland, wanting nothing but the warmest, best loaves. 

(I also stop by the Coop to get some beans and cranberries. I never make grocery lists -- I keep everything in my head. As a result, I forget stuff!)

The drive there and back is beautiful! Our lakes have frozen (what a surprise) and the darting wind gusts are blowing small drifts of snow around, even as the sun is visibly trying to poke through a light cloud cover. I stop the car just to look.

Breakfast. Happy holidays to you!!

Ed gets the message that friends are coming by with a homemade Kringle and pfeffernusse cookies. Delicious treats! Wonderful visit. The day just gets better and better!

I have some light food preparation to do today, both for this eve's dinner and tomorrow's. Presents are ready. The sun is brilliant. Oh! A chicken is stuck again. Hang on, girl, I'll give you a boost.

And in the late afternoon I go to my daughter's house. 

(a little old elf...)

This is the tradition for us. I take foods over there (and because they are not foods Ed would choose to eat, he stays home for this one) and fix a traditional meal that one would find in maybe Scotland at this time.

The kids are giddy, as so many would be on Christmas Eve. They've baked cookies for the big guy and his reindeer. 

How many of them hang onto the belief that Santa comes down a chimney at night? Probably only Sparrow. Snowdrop has serious doubts, Sandpiper is too young to follow such stuff. Still, it hardly matters. It's a story that we tell each other because it has all the elements of good fun. 

It's getting late. Santa surely is sliding around on the snowy landscape of our state. Easy job for him this year and just a tad warmer here than up on the North Pole. 

I take a few more pics, of the kids, of the whole family in pjs, of the last Eve moments.

And then I head home. 

All is bright. All is very calm.