Fleeting moments flit and stick to varying degrees. Their stickiness may happen with ease or with work. Or they may simply stick for a spontaneous second before they disappear like a speck of dust dancing through a sunbeam.
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I have embarked on the annual “decorating for Christmas” task. Tradition? Overwhelming project? Whatever it is labeled, it begins with dragging many large plastic storage tubs down iron stairs from the loft in the barn to the main level, which is our garage. This year, I have resolved that these will no longer be stored up there; rather, they will seek shelter on the main floor in the garage since Christmas decorations are used every single year.
To make room for the tubs, kids’ balls, bats, kites, baseball helmets, bike helmets, and such are being removed. The thought of this cleaning out saddened me more than the actual removal of items that have been collecting dust for a good solid five years. But the time has come as both of our sons now surpass my height and their heads are the size of men’s rather than little boys who once wore those helmets.
“Those things we use most often should not be in the loft but rather easily accessible in the garage.” What a perspective shift. And a shift in storage tub management.
A week ago, I hauled all the Christmas tubs down to the garage and staged them in their new home, where the kids’ old stuff and my unused gardening supplies previously lived. Then last weekend, my husband Bill and my younger son Liam moved them to the covered back porch. Once there, I could go through them on my own time without dragging the dirty tubs into the house. (Perhaps you remember the Squirrels in the Loft? Or more recently, our attempts to clean out The Barn Loft so a virtual golf course could be set up under those high flying beams?)
I’ve had a few weeks of high gear clutter clearing. I set dates on the calendar for the Vietnam Veterans of America (VVA) to pick up donations once a month, and I have been putting unwanted stuff on my front porch every Sunday for quick pick-ups by members of our local “Buy Nothing” Facebook page. I decided to keep that momentum going with the Christmas tubs: if there was a decoration that I really didn’t like or rarely put out, it went into a cardboard box labeled “VVA.” That box was smaller than I had hoped it would be.
Left with items I wanted, I was in awe of how many decorations I still have—and wondered where should I put them this holiday season? I opened photos on my phone from Christmas last year: I had taken up-close photos of the shelves, windowsills, and tables adorned with all things Christmas. As I took each snowman and Santa out of its box, I referred to the photo to see where it lived last year. This method made decorating surprisingly easy. I do not have a natural artful or crafty eye, but I can copy things. So rather than creating new scenes, I re-enacted last year’s.
In October during another household sorting, I found all of the candles squirreled away throughout the house and put them on an easily accessible shelf on the main floor. Read that as not on a high shelf where I need a step ladder and not on the floor where I have to drop to hands and knees to rummage for what I’m looking for. Long tapers, chubby rounds, and real and battery-operated tealights—they have a consolidated home. Once the main decorations were up, I ambled along adding candles wherever I could. Are candles associated with entertaining? With having the whole Norman Rockwell family gathered in the living room? Both of those are ideals that I’m curbing. In fact, I’m the one who likes the warm glow of candlelight.
This time last year, spirits were darker. I remember a Jewish friend inviting a large group of online friends to join in her tradition of lighting a candle each day of Hanukkah. “We could all use a little light right now—whether you are Jewish or not.” At the time, her words were so gracious in a world filled with divergence and darkness. A year later, I still remember that short, fleeting sentence. It stuck.
I wake up each morning before sunrise. This month, in addition to turning on twinkling strings of lights each morning, I’m lighting candles. Not for company. Not for my family. But simply for the warmth that I feel from their glow.