I love everything about this jelly. My best friend gave it to me as a gift last fall. She made it herself. Can you imagine how many tiny grapes she had to gather? I put it away to save for a snowy day on the long stretch between the holidays and spring. And today was that day.
I brought it from my pantry, liking even the feel of it in my hand. In the kitchen, I held the quilted glass jar up to the window so the light would shine through its burgundy hues. Then I brought it up to my eyes so that it eclipsed everything else, so that all I could see was its color. I laughed and carried it to the counter. On its lid in Holly’s magic marker script it says “Wild Grape 9-24.” I remember September. I nibbled wild grapes at the wetlands. Holly said it didn’t set up right; it was more syrup than jelly. But I didn’t care. I removed the ring from the top of jar, my mouth tingling in anticipation. Then I carefully pried off the lid. With the tip of a teaspoon I dipped into the thick red pool as if I were performing a sacrament. Then, my eyes shut, paying full attention, I tasted it. I nearly swooned at the tangy sweet intensity of it, tasting like the culmination of autumn’s best productions. It will, I know, disappear before many days pass. But I will keep the jar on my window sill and remember the taste of wild grapes and think of September and Holly when I see it.
It snowed today, as if to cool the feverish dreams of the trees, who sensed, in some quiet tree-knowing way, that on rolling hills much like these in which they stretched their roots, but far away, thousands of trees were burning.
Let us not take this glistening day for granted, they said to one another, and they lifted their limbs to the morning sky and sang their thanks.
To my surprise, the world outside my window is covered in snow, with more shooting down, and a pair of cardinals waiting, and one of the little birds, too, as if they were posing as a Christmas card and if you opened it rays of laughing joy would leap out and it would be signed, “Love, Yes.”
It’s one thing to remember it as a fact: “Winter can be wondrous.”
But immediately my crabby inner voice counters with “Yeah, yeah, and bitter cold, too, and a nuisance. Not my favorite. ” And just like that, I think away “wondrous,” burying it beneath winter’s more tangible features as shivers run down my arms.
Then one day snowflakes the size of dimes begin to fall and they keep on falling until the ground and every twig on every tree is covered with them. And the kid in me makes me put on my boots and jacket and climb the hill to get a look at the scene from within it.
And I realize that “wondrous” is breathing all around me.
I’m hibernating. In spurts. None of them as long as I’d like.
It’s winter, the time for turning inward, living on the stored, nutritious fat I gathered over the summer. Examining it, this thick, luxuriant heap of experiences, seeing what contributions each made to my being.
I am declaring myself an Elder now and claiming all the rights and privileges of that status.
I give myself permission to do whatever I want.
I’m finding this current segment of my journey to be the most intriguing one so far, despite the fact I’m well experienced in multi-faceted endeavors. – Once I designed a business card that described me as an “Adept Generalist.” I have sometimes gone by the handle “Susan Manyhats.” – But this time “multi-faceted” doesn’t touch it. Everything’s layers deep now and convoluted and whizzing past at breakneck speed.
Nevertheless, it is winter. Whether the calendar says so or not. And I am curled in a warm room, gazing out my window, letting my mind wander, making up stories about what I hear and see. I decided I’ll share snippets of my dreams and musings. And this is that project’s start.
I don’t know what it will become. It may disappear with the dawn.
But here it is, for now, a record of the dreams I entertain as I gaze from my tree house window.
* * *
An Excerpt from my Journal
12/05/24 10:55 am
Don’t give up hope, I tell myself. The 250th birthday of the USA happens in ’26. Celebrations are being planned in detail even now. Players are moving into place.
It could turn out to be a reclaiming of the true virtues of humanity – a new Renaissance! How splendid would that be!
It’s possible, I suppose, despite the odds. And a girl’s allowed to dream.
All that we need is a great sweeping away of the falsehoods and delusions.
That’s all.
Everything depends on how that unfolds. Literally. Everything.
It’s all or nothing. And there’s no predicting which way it will go.
What an astonishing time to be here as a witness!
Interlude
When I turned on the plant light for the grandmother spider plant in the eastern corner of the living room, an impulse to play Christmas carols on the keyboard arose, and I obeyed it, and it was wonderful. I hadn’t played so much as a single tune in months. I decide that I’m going to have to do it more often.
The carols carried me back across decades, acting as the soundtrack of a movie of Christmases past, each one precious and touching. It’s a truly powerful time. And inescapable. Whole new dimensions of reality emerge; previously unnoticed veils float away. The imagined becomes real, and things you never even dreamed manifest as well.
“The Thing Itself”
11:30 am Bannon’s on. I’ll catch this last half hour. He’s going to discuss where he thinks we are and what we need to do between now and Jan 21.
“This is the main event,” he says. “This is the thing itself.”
