Christmas is over, sort of

Today was the day I took down the last of the Christmas decorations. The ones on the outside of the house. This year we decorated the outside with wreaths that were lighted at night. Around Christmas day I realized to my horror that I had all the bows in the wrong place. All around the neighborhood wreaths had bows at the top, mine had them at the bottom. How did I miss this? Note to self for next year....

In the back of our basement hang the wreaths. They will gather dust until some time around October, when I'll start fooling around with them, checking lights, replacing bows. In the summer, when Christmas seems so far off, they hang there in silence ready for service on a moments notice. It's nice to see them there, even if I am not allowed to display them publicly.

In a nearby closet are all the Christmas decorations. Packed away finally. We took the inside ones down a little sooner than normal this year. I'm not sure why, something to do with the boredom of a New Years Day. Once Christmas Day is past my wife starts secretly packing things away, like a Mission Impossible to see how much she can remove without my noticing. One day it's "Hey, where's the big Santa?". The next morning it's "My dearest, what happened to the NOEL candleholders?". A few moments later, "Where are the NUTCRACKERS and who kidnapped baby Jesus !!!!" I know the answer, they are all part of the long parade of decorations back to the Christmas closet.

My one victory this year was leaving the outside lights on much longer than in the past. Usually I turn them off on January 6, which is Epiphany for the western world and Christmas Day for the orthodox Christians. Seems about the right time. But the last few years I noticed that a few of my neighbors kept their lights on long into the winter. This year I joined them and kept mine on until the end of January. We had no snow this year, and the lights added a bit of merriment to an otherwise dull and dark and grey and brown landscape. I set them to turn on/off at dusk/dawn which meant they were on when I came home from work, and still going when I left in the morning.

My wife's stepfather, Onis, was born on Christmas eve. He will be buried in two days. After 101 years and 102 Christmases. Down here we all have boxes of little ornaments and trinkets that we haul out once a year. He is at that place beyond the horizon, where it is always Christmas and always Easter. For him, the real thing is just now beginning.