It’s been a quiet week for us interspersed with short online or outdoor masked visits with our children and grandchildren. Though I enjoyed having

A Quiet Week

for the holidays.

I think that winter really and truly arrived in Minnesota last week and that we will see snow covered landscapes for awhile now. This morning one of our neighbors was out clearing off an ice rink on the pond behind our house (after the recent snow). It looks ready for family skating and kids’ hockey games.

I “attended” Christmas Eve services for our church on Zoom. It was sweet to sit in my nightgown, wrapped up in a blanket in my favorite chair and listen to Christmas music and hear the Christmas story re-told once again.

Christmas this year reminded me a little bit of the Christmas I spent alone in Hawaii in 2012. I found Christmas much less commercialized on the Big Island of Hawaii than at home. Though I missed being with family over the holidays I found the peaceful quiet days surrounding Christmas a welcome change.

I especially enjoyed attending Christmas Eve services at the Hawaiian Catholic Church in Hilo. The service was partly spoken in English, partly Hawaiian but the story and the music were familiar and the beautiful children’s pageant touched my heart even when presented in another language. This year, since I didn’t go out shopping for anything and we spent so much time at home I felt a little sense of the lovely quiet contemplative space I felt during that Christmas.

Still Photographing Amaryllis Flowers

My amaryllis flowers continue to occupy my photography area in the dining room. The first blooms are quite wilted and dry while new buds are popping open once again. My second amaryllis plant has a tall bud beginning to get ready to open also.

And the last amaryllis continues to very very slowly send up a single bud but no new leaves. I wonder if the bud will ever really grow up to burst into bloom or will simply tease me with a few millimeters of growth every week or so.

Yesterday I made a couple of in camera double exposures again, shifting the camera so that the wilted flowers were on the left side of the frame and the new flower buds were on the right side of the frame. It’s still not really what I was hoping to create so I will probably continue to experiment until I either give up or manage to create what I’m visioning.

For Readers

I finished reading a book by William Kent Krueger on Friday and found it a touching adventure story somewhat akin to Mark Twain’s Huck Finn. It’s called This Tender Land. In the tale orphaned children, face a series of adventures and misadventures. They encounter good and evil and through all of their fantastical adventures retain their good hearts and caring for one another. Beginning at one of the notorious schools created housing and educating the children of indigenous tribes in central Minnesota and ending in St. Louis, it was a story full of twists and turns and unexpected grace.

“There is a river that runs through time and the universe, vast and inexplicable, a flow of spirit that is at the heart of existence, and every molecule of our being is a part of it. And what is God but the whole of that river?”

   — William Kent Krueger, This Tender Land

A second book that I finished last week seems like a good one to recommend if you are thinking about making any habit changes in the new year. It’s called Tiny Habits by BJ Fogg and I found it fascinating and helpful. Fogg helped me understand human behavior and how tiny changes can help create huge changes. He starts simply and builds each chapter on what came before, slowly helping you to understand how to most successfully create new habits. I may tell a tale about the single tiny habit I am working on at a later date. It’s too early yet to claim success. But using his ideas I think I have a very good chance of making my tiny new habit stick and grow.

Did you also have a quiet holiday week this year? How did that feel for you?

May you walk in beauty.