The week before Christmas

We've reached the last week! I feel as though it got here awfully quickly, but then it always does. And now it's the time when I really want to sit back and savor the season -- but that's impossible, because there's still so much to be done. It's always like this. Why is it always like this? Because at Christmas you have to do all your regular stuff PLUS all the Christmas stuff, and there just isn't time. Nor do I have the energy.

It's 2:10 pm as I am starting this post, and I was planning to make another batch of cookies today. I've only made three so far (see photo), and my gut tells me I need to have six for it to really be Christmas. I should make a batch today, one on Monday, and one on Tuesday. Then we can make fudge on Wednesday or Thursday, and Christmas will be complete.

I know that's kind of nonsense -- but it's also kind of not. Christmas is all about ritual, and for me making cookies is a crucial part of that ritual. So I must continue on. I just cleaned the kitchen and started the dishwasher, so everything's ready for me to make batch #4.

I decided that the twins were going to help with the cookies this year, and so far they kind of have. I made the M&M/sprinkles cookies by myself when they were in school on Friday, and I made the panocha squares yesterday afternoon after they'd gotten tired of helping. But they were actively involved in making the candy cane cookies, and they keep asking me when I'm going to make today's batch.

When we started making the candy cane cookies yesterday, Teen B asked me what we do first, and I said, well, read the recipe to me. So he read, carefully, "Sift 2-1/2 cups sifted flour and 1 tsp salt. Mix together. Divide dough into 2 parts."

I said, "No, you skipped the beginning. Read the whole recipe."

He said, "That's where it starts."

I came over and looked at the recipe. Sure enough, my mother's recipe for candy cane cookies gives no information on how to incorporate the "shortening," powdered sugar, egg, extracts, and vanilla. "Well," I explained, "when you've made enough cookies in your life, you'll know how almost all of them start. You cream butter and sugar, add the egg and flavoring, and then mix in the dry ingredients."

"Sure," said Teen B, rolling his eyes. "I believe you."

I was quite amazed by that recipe, which I've been making for 40 years. It has a lot of additions in my handwriting, but I never bothered to add anything like "cream butter and sugar," because I didn't need to. When you compare this recipe to the kind of thing you find on the internet these days, with agonizingly detailed instructions on how to perform every step (because, presumably, people don't know how to cook anymore), well, hmm. What can I say?

***

I'm back. I took a break and made the dough for the next variety (eggnog cookies) and now I'm baking the first batch in the oven. They bake for 12 minutes, so I will go back and forth. This will probably lead to a jumbled blog post, but I'm sure it's fine.

This past week I had planned to finish my Christmas shopping, and I think I mostly did. On Friday I still had this angsty feeling that I needed to go out and spend more money, more more more, but I carefully stayed home instead. I usually pay bills on Friday and after looking at the current state of my credit card I decided that I could be done with shopping, for now. It isn't really the shopping that's caused the financial distress -- Rocket Boy's plane ticket to come home (Tuesday night!) was $643 and I spent $567 repairing my car (it was due for its 150,000 mile checkup) and I donated $255 on Colorado Gives Day and then there was our post-Thanksgiving trip to Cheyenne, plus we've been eating out too much. Compared to all that, the shopping was nothing. But I still have to pay off all of it, so I can't keep shopping!

***

OK, batch #2 just went in the oven. Batch #1 looks pretty good, cooling on wire racks.

We had a "high wind event" on Wednesday, that I found rather terrifying. I suppose it was the scenes of devastation from the tornadoes in Kentucky (and quite near Rocket Boy, in Missouri and Illinois!). Also, I remembered the high wind event in Utah -- was it this summer? last summer? -- when all those big trees were uprooted. Anyway, I was worried, more than I usually am. We have such big trees, and the Siberian Elm in particular likes to drop its branches. 

It was a scary day (see photo of the wind speeds up at NCAR, which is just above us on the hill), but we never lost power (though many of our neighbors did) and we didn't have any damage. There are some branches down in the backyard that I should take a look at (or leave for Rocket Boy to take a look at), but I don't think anything happened to the roof. I sound so sure of myself. Maybe I should go outside and look at the roof. It's only been four days since the wind event.

OK, I looked. The roof is fine. There's a large branch down in the yard, maybe 8-10 feet long, but it didn't fall anywhere near the roof. It's almost like the tree dropped it there on purpose, knowing that we would be sad if it destroyed our roof.

There is damage in the neighborhood. One house that I walk past almost every day on my walks lost its fence -- just fell over into the yard. And I heard about another neighbor who had a tree fall on their house. I'm sure it didn't mean to. 91-mph gusts of wind are hard on trees.

***

OK, third and last batch is in the oven. The recipe doesn't make a lot -- I ended up with 43 cookies total -- but they still have to be frosted, so they're complicated. Complicated recipes shouldn't make too many cookies, otherwise it would be too exhausting.

Tomorrow the kids and I will do sugar cookies. That's exhausting.

Something occurred to me last night: it's a week until Christmas and I have yet to read a Christmas book! The only exception is the kids' bedtime book: we're reading something we found in a Little Free Library called The Dog Who Thought He Was Santa. It's OK, better than I thought it was going to be, even though every other chapter is narrated by the dog. We'll try to finish it up in a few days and then read Christmas picture books like we did last year.

But for my own reading, not a Christmas book in sight. My last eight books have been as follows: the book group book, a biography of Rutherford B. Hayes, my last Classics Challenge book, and five serious non-fiction books. I don't know why I am so focused on non-fiction right now. Normally I don't enjoy it very much, but this year I've just kept reading it. Depending on what you count as non-fiction, I finished my 37th (or 38th, or 36th) nonfiction book this afternoon. For me, that's a lot. It was my 127th book of the year, so OK, that's a lot of fiction too (90 books, hmm). But when you figure a lot of the fiction was books I read to the kids and books for the book group and books for the Classics Challenge -- out of the other books I read, I really did choose to read a lot of non-fiction. For me.

The book I finished this afternoon I didn't love. It was called The Sweet Spot: The Pleasures of Suffering and the Search for Meaning by Paul Bloom. It's popular at our library right now -- I had to put a hold on it and wait for it. What I can't remember is WHY I did that. Where did I hear about this book and why did I think I wanted to read it? I feel as though it has something to do with another book I read recently, The Second Mountain: The Quest for a Moral Life by David Brooks. Which I did not like, but I think it might have led me to this book, which I also did not like. I mean, it was OK. Just didn't really blow me away.

So here's the thing. Both books were OK, not terrible, though I didn't feel particularly enlightened by either one. But both of them were written by men around my age (Brooks is 60, Bloom is 57) who have recently divorced their first wives (around their age) and the mothers of their children, and are now with much younger women, who they claim, in their Acknowledgements sections, have made their lives fabulous. Brooks' new wife is 37 (today, oddly), Bloom's new "partner's" age is unknown, but she's an assistant professor and as recently as four years ago was a grad student (his grad student), so I'm guessing early to mid 30s?

It's hard for me to pay a lot of attention to the blatherings of men my age who have just had midlife crises and come out on the other end with hot new women. I just don't trust their insights, somehow. I'd rather hear from their ex-wives.

***

I got the kids to take a walk to the park/school with me, so we've had a little exercise today (not a lot, but it's OK). It wasn't too cold today (better than yesterday, which was frigid). There was almost no one out walking, though, which seemed strange. I guess people are either busy with Christmas prep or they're out of town. The students are gone -- off to their hometowns to catch or spread Covid. 

I should make some plans for the week ahead. Two more batches of cookies. Rocket Boy arrives very late Tuesday night (I think his plane gets in around 11 pm, so I'll pick him up at the airport). We could go to a movie one of the days, but I don't know if we will. I need to do a lot more cleaning and Christmas prep. I still haven't repaired the tree, so I haven't finished decorating it either. And there are boxes in the living room that shouldn't be there. Also, I should clean the bathroom. Sigh. That might not happen.

Oh, I know one other thing I was going to mention! I had a little bit of Christmas magic today. I've been feeling for the last few days as though there is a presence in the house -- OK, I know this is nonsense, but food items keep jumping off shelves, things like that. A few times I've said, out loud, "Stop that," though I don't know who or what I'm speaking to. Anyway, today I was doing the kids' laundry and I dropped a shirt on the floor, on its way into the washing machine. I bent down to pick it up and underneath it was this pink sock.

And the thing is, I know the pink sock was not on the floor before I dropped the shirt. I lost this pink sock (it's mine, did you guess?) while doing my laundry about 10 days ago and I made a thorough search of the floor of the laundry room/garage then. I did the kids' laundry last weekend and there was no pink sock on the floor. I am quite sure that the little elves who steal socks decided today that they were done with this one, so they returned it by sneaking it under the shirt that dropped.

I know what you're thinking -- you're thinking I'm nuts. Obviously the sock was under something else and my movements knocked it into the open. And of course you can believe that all you want. But I know the sock was gone and then it was returned. Christmas magic. I believe.