White Manna

On the heels of the last storm is a new one, currently still dumping snow over the states of New Mexico and Colorado.

There were a couple of inches on the drive this morning; when I got home mid-day there was at least another inch. I shoveled the access points on the drive. Then at sundown I went out and shoveled the drive again -- another 2 inches had accumulated. I did a thorough job of the drive, and while doing so another 1/2-inch fell...

Went out just now (9:30) and cleared a path through the going-on-2-inches which had covered my earlier clearings. The undisturbed snow in the drive is 8 inches deep.

It is a good packing snow -- comes up in great blocks on the snow shovel -- and I took a break from shoveling to make a snow obelisk in the back yard. Rolled up the first level of it, a la snowman construction, then rolled up a smaller cylinder to place atop that one. Then stacked disks of snow atop those. As I used a ladder to place the last disks, the whole thing now looms 9 feet tall. Since erected, it has developed a curve to one side -- so now there is a huge phallus thrusting up from the snow of the back yard. I wonder if it will last to Easter...?



As much of a hassle as the snow may be (travelling is definitely affected, and my workplace is sure to be snowed in tomorrow) the transformation which the snow has wrought upon the world is beautiful. The sky is a strange soft pink from reflected cityglow, a bright backdrop limning the limbs of the trees in the yard, these branches in turn limned by the balanced coatings of snow which are capping every twig, every bit of fence wire -- even power lines are dignified by the snow. The world is eerily quiet. I walk about, quietly crunching into the snow surface, marvelling at the wonder and wondering at the marvel. It seems as though I can feel each flake as it coasts past my face.

Memories strengthen my wonder: these snowfalls are more like the ones I recall from my youth, when we first moved to New Mexico. We could expect several big snow dumps each winter then, deep enough to close schools and provide the basis for snowmen and snowforts and massive snowball fights, with sledding in the streets. New Mexico has been relatively dry for the last 20-odd years, so these deep falls make me feel like a kid again. (OK, more of a kid again.)

Sure it's a hassle, and sure if I lived in Minnesota or somesuch I would probably tire of it, but damn this snow in the desert is magical.

A Cnristmas Eve Tale

A New Christmas Spirit, or, Ain't I the Dickens?

To advance this tale it must be understood by all that I have been, off and on and for much of my life, a bookseller. And I am as prone as most others of that breed to fanciful notions and antique behavior.

So you will appreciate that when I dressed up that Christmas Eve, it was not at all unusual and it was, in fact, my habit and practice to do so for weeks preceding each Christmas day. Clad in tailcoat, weskit and tophat, with ascot and stickpin, every bit the Victorian gentleman, I would greet customers into the store. I was always happy to bring a smile to holiday-stressed faces, and over the years the customers came to expect my costuming as much as I did. For those who inquired as to why I was garbed so, I would reply "Why, to reflect the spirit of the season, of course!" And to those who inquired as to my identity, I would say that I was representing the spirit of Charles Dickens.

So it was that when Patricia and I were headed home on that Christmas Eve, after playing elf and delivering presents, I was still garbed as Dickens.

There is a wonderful tradition in parts of New Mexico -- on some important holidays, especially Halloween (Day of the Dead) and Christmas Eve, people decorate the graves of their loved ones. The graves are tidied and fresh flowers are set out, as are offerings of food and drink. On Christmas Eve small gifts, cards, and trees are left as well. And luminaria are set out around the graves, candle glow lending soft light in the cemetery. (On one night, the thought of which still brings tears to my eyes, we saw a mass of luminaria on a distant grave; on approaching closer, we found that they spelled out "Love You".)

It is our habit to visit the cemetery late on Christmas Eve, to walk among the graves and witness the care given in honor of departed loved ones. On this particular Christmas Eve, we drove slowly through the parking lot of the cemetery to get an overall view, then headed up a short service road (amusingly & appropriately signed as a "Dead End") which heads up a slight rise beside the cemetery, to get another view.

To our surprise, there was a medium-sized Christmas tree lying in the middle of the dirt road. While we have often seen Christmas trees dumped along roads, it is usually after the event! It seemed a shame that this perfectly presentable tree should miss Christmas, so I got out and put it atop the car. Then we drove back down and parked in front of the cemetery gate.

In the Bernalillo cemetery, the area to the south is more recent and better-kept. Thus, on Christmas Eve it is the best lit, as it has the most luminaria about. By contrast, the area to the northeast is dark and relatively gloomy, and a bit sad since the lack of light means that it has not had visitors...

While Patricia moved slowly through the southern part of the cemetery, reading the cards and messages and paying her respects, I took the tree down from atop the car and headed for the darker area of the cemetery, intent on finding the grave most in need of a Christmas tree. I wandered about until I found just the one -- deep in the unlit portion of the cemetery, not forlorn (someone had mounded the earth on the grave sometime in the last few years) but obviously unvisited. So I set about giving the unknown resident of the grave a tree.

I had nothing with which to dig a hole for the tree to stand in, but close at hand there was a 2-foot wooden cross, the bottom of which had broken off at an angle -- just the thing for scraping a hole into the earth of the grave. Holding the tree upright with my left hand, I crouched down and set about making a hole with the cross.

Just then a minivan pulled in through the gate of the cemetery, and began driving along the loop road which runs through the middle of it -- very likely a family coming to see the luminaria. As they reached the end of the road and were about to make the turn to loop back out, their headlight beams were about to fall across me. Just before the light reached me, I stood up straight and still.

The minivan stopped. I can only imagine what they thought when they saw me amidst the graves -- a very tall, bearded man, clad in Victorian attire and tophat, eyeglasses reflecting blankly in the light from their headlights, a Christmas tree in one hand and a broken cross in the other. For a long timeless moment the van sat there; I stood perfectly still. Then the minivan left. Quickly.

So, my friends, if you are ever regaled with the tale of The Tree Specter of Christmas Eve (for, as we all know, tales grow in the telling), you will now know its source.

Good Holidays to all, and a Marvelous New Year coming!