Dancing on the Edge of the Cloud Wall

As hard as it was for me to muster the holiday spirit this year, it finally did settle in, probably as a side benefit of catching up on rest due to a combination of the weather and our holiday hours at the cafe.

And it's really hard to remain a Grinch during a white Christmas...

To start with, you must know that the impending post-holiday season is looming like Mark Helprin's cloud wall in one of my favorite books, A Winter's Tale. The cloud wall is a massive, impenetrable fog between Manhattan and New Jersey that swallows boats whole and. Or, maybe a better metaphor is Stephen King's Mist, a fog far more treacherous than Helprin's dimension-bending precursor to the Lincoln Tunnel.

A failed attempt to get me into the spirit

In other words, I'm not particularly looking forward to the end-of-the-year bureaucratic nonsense a business has to go through. I mean, it's not like I'm we're Kraft Foods or Nabisco. But we sure could use their accountants. And their money.

Despite the appearance of gray, swirling confusion on the horizon, I've made peace with the fact that, like Helprin's Baymen, who make sport of outrunning the cloud wall, it is my destiny live right at its edge (in the book, this location is called "Bayonne.")*

No, I'm not moving to Bayonne.

My point is, we had a very nice holiday. But you know I can't write anything that simply.

We haven't had a true white Christmas in a very long time and snow on the ground is not as devastating around here, particularly because you learn very fast to have a four-wheel drive vehicle at your disposal. Which is to say, Dark Garden made it here, broken leg and all.

And, of course, both Heirs made it home and were stuck here happy to bask in the warmth of family and Heir 2's traveling wet bar. (Or, as Eleanor of Aquitaine says in Lion in the Winter: "I am locked up with my sons. What mother does not dream of that?")

Of course, I had to assure Heir 1 that the basket of nuts would be here. He doesn't eat the nuts, but insists they be in this basket every Christmas. One year I forgot to put them out and chaos ensued. In fact, no one eats the nuts except Heir 2, who eats all the hazelnuts. The rest of the nuts may be 15 years old.

Here is Linguiniland, not only wasn't there room at the inn;
the stable was getting pretty crowded also.

So we ate and drank and until 2 a.m. played The Game of Things, which for us is actually The Game of References to Gross Bodily Functions and Male Genitalia, no matter how hard I try to keep it on high ground. Further proof I live in a frat house.

Tomorrow we do it again for New Years Eve. Then it's back to reality.

You'll find me dancing at the edge of the cloud wall.

*Just found out they're turning A Winter's Tale into a movie, but shooting was held up by hurricane Sandy. I so hope they do this justice -- it could be a really beautiful film!