every time a bell rings
december 4th, 2000

I feel great. I suppose I just wanted to share that. I'm not sure why, or 
by what power. Perhaps it is simply the adrenaline of the 
end-of-the-semester rush pumping through my veins, making me feel 
immortal, as if I could take on the world. So much to do, and somehow it 
seems exhilirating. Maybe I'm just a glutton for punishment. Or maybe it's 
just because November is over. Or maybe I'm just hormonal. It happens. ;)

I don't know why I hate November so much, but I always have. Thanksgiving 
is, by far, my least favorite holiday. All of the beautiful leaves have 
fallen dead from the trees, the ground becomes a squishy mess of brown and 
gray, there is no sun, and it's too warm for snow, and the rain renders 
itself useless, just falling from the sky without hopes of bringing 
growth, or warmth, or rebirth. And it's that cold kind of rain, that you 
can't dance in, that you can't enjoy, it just gets under your skin and 
makes every pore in your body a shivering mass of cold, without the crisp, 
eye-opening awareness of the chill of winter, and without the childlike 
playfulness of snow.

December means Christmas, and the First Big Snow. December means 
vacations, and laughter, and my grandparents magically turning into a 
doting, loving couple for three weeks. December means photographs, failed 
attempts at gingerbread houses, and driving around in the middle of the 
night to look at all of the beautiful Christmas decorations. December 
means candy and Rudolf and Jimmy Stewart. December means David Bowie and 
Bing Crosby singing Peace On Earth on MTV.

I took Ash to the big "Dickens of a Christmas" festival in downtown 
Greeneville last Friday. The street was full of men and women in Victorian 
costume, of Father Christmas, of carriage rides, and Celtic music. 
Everyone gave Ash candy. I knelt in the entranceway of the General Morgan 
Inn and fed her small cookies. She spilled hot apple cider all over my arm 
- it happens. We danced and sang and saw the living nativity scene. We 
bumped into old science teachers. Story of my life.

I'm a happy girl. School will be over a week from today, and Christmas is 
coming. And Ash, my beautiful Ash, my incredibly intelligent daughter who 
will pull a package of diapers off the dining room table, scoot them over 
to the window, and stand up on them so she can see outside and look at the 
Christmas lights - she'll be old enough to really enjoy it, to really get 
a kick out of it all, to rip into presents and each wrapping paper and get 
sticky with cookie dough and icing.

God bless us, every one.