Hi all,
First, a couple notes:
This Saturday, January 20, is the Sidney Drop-In for Writers at the Sidney Library. I’m looking forward to seeing everyone again, and have new teas to entice the tastebuds and new prompts to satisfy the writing urge. More information here.
And on Saturday, January 27, my friend Monika and I will host workshops at the Cook Street Village Activity Centre in Victoria. Mine will be from 1:30 to 3:30. In “Writing in Your Future”, we will use ancient divination practices as lighthearted prompts to call up new writing. More information here.
Next, I must ask if it is too late to talk about Christmas trees?
The Christmas tree at my house is still up. My mum and I both have trouble taking it down, as that means Christmas is over. Every year we keep it up until at least January 6, because Mum says that’s the official end date of Christmas. Then after that we keep telling each other “next weekend” or “we’ll have time next week” until it’s really ridiculous and we’re embarrassed enough to take it down. So I hope it’s still okay to tell you about our Christmas tree.
To do that I have to tell you about the year of the big storm. That year Mum had me drag the top of the pine that had fallen in the yard into the living room. We fought fitting it into the stand—the bottom was crooked—then turned it in slow pirouettes to find the fullest face to direct into the room. We were so proud.
Since then all our trees have been weeds. Volunteers, we call them, when they root in the flower beds. Anything coniferous and vaguely triangular will do. This year we didn’t have to pirouette to find the best side because the back of the tree was dead where it grew into the hedge. There was kind of a big gap in the middle of the tree where no branches grew, and the bottom branches jutted far enough out to trip people walking through the living room, so we had to prune them with Mum’s big pruners. We had to go light on the lights lest the branches bow down and lose their ornaments. But we are so proud.
For the first time, we actually had two trees this year. The second, basement tree was a grand fir we noticed last fall growing in the middle of our lilac bush. It smells of grapefruit and green, and its branches are even more slender than the upstairs tree. They droop under the lightest ornaments we could find so that the ends point downwards, but it’s gamely still holding them all. Only one ornament so far has slipped off. We are so proud.
FROM THE SPIRAL NOTEBOOK
“Coconut” by Paul Hostovsky is an excellent poem that was introduced to me in a writing workshop long ago. I wrote the following poem in response. It really doesn’t make sense if you don’t read “Coconut” first, which you can find here.
A Response to “Coconut” by Paul Hostovsky
We put happiness in the middle of the kitchen table and tried to figure how to get inside it: piñata style, blindfolded with a bat? A shovel? A Japanese saw, the tiny one from the hand tool store that cuts on the pull in toward your chest? A drill, a needle with syringe? Maybe it’s not about breaking in maybe it comes out, one of us said finally. We tried petting it like the fine skull of a small dog, and when that didn’t work we tried singing. Kumbaya and Beatles because we all knew the words. We tried to sit very still the way you do at the bird sanctuary, and let happiness come out on its own. We argued over what kind of food to use as bait—someone said salty I was sure sweet. We tried peanut M&Ms as a compromise, but nothing. Finally we wrote a note: Hello happiness, Please come out. We need you. We rolled the note tight and stuck it through the hole we’d made earlier with the saw. We waited. When we pulled the note back the paper was wet and smelled of something other-than-here and then one of us said I had more fun today than I can remember…
NOTES
Please feel free to reply to this email, either by hitting reply (it will only go to me), or by commenting on the Substack website (there are little speech bubble things at the top and bottom of the letter) if you’d like to be part of a larger discussion. You can also “like” the post if you want.
Also feel free to pass this along to any friends who might be interested. They can subscribe, if they like, by hitting the big blue button that says “subscribe”.
And thanks, as always, for reading.
yours,
Kelsey
What a delightful little poem and such a beautiful response to Paul's also beautiful poem. Thank you for sharing! PS: I just put Christmas away on Sunday. I did it quickly, as if to pretend I wasn't doing it and I could delay the shock of its sudden absence. It really truly is one of the things I dislike the most.
This is such a lovely post it made me smile and I’m still smiling as I write this - I think I’ll try putting happiness on my table today to take the place of this morning’s little bit of sadness. Thanks Kelsey.