FAQ #5: Did you send a long, boring Holiday Greeting?
As I begin this Holiday 1995 note it's December the 18th (one week until Christmas--this will surely arrive after St. Nick) at 11:24 AM in Denmark (4:24 AM in Memphis where this journey began); its 28 degrees (F) outside (which is wonderful since it is (temporarily) preserving the "winter wonderland" of a thick, fur like coating of frost laid on by two days of fog on all of Hosby's hollies, firs, cedars, lawns, bushes, thatched roofs as well as satellite TV antennas (as I type I'm watching/listening to last night's 60 Minutes via a UK 24 hour news station named Sky News (their sports coverage includes cricket, which is a mystifying game) . . . if I get tired of that I'll watch CNN live (whose sports coverage includes American style football (as opposed to what the rest of the world calls football, which is what Americans call soccer) which is a mystifyingly brutal and violent confrontation)). (If you get lost in the parentheses...retrace, and try again; My high school English teacher (Ms S.D. Favara) could have easily predicted that getting lost in my writing is easier than following it.)
Now I'll turn to plagiarizing from one of last year's Christmas arrivals:
There is a list of folks I know
All written in a book,
And every year at Christmas time
I go and take a look.
And that is when I realize
These names are not a part
Of the book they're written in
But of my very heart.
For each name stands for someone
Who has touched my life somehow,
And in the meeting they've become
The "Rhyme of the Rhyme"
I really feel I am composed
Of each remembered name,
And while you may not be aware of feelings quite the same,
My life is so much better
Than it was before you came.
For once that you have showed someone
That years can not erase
The memory of a pleasant word
Or of a friendly face.
So never think my Christmas cards
Are just a mere routine
Of names upon a list, forgotten in between
For when I send a Christmas card
That is addressed to you
It is because you're on that list of
Of folks I am indebted to.
And whether I've known you
For many years or just a few
In some way you have had a part
In shaping things I do.
So every year when Christmas comes
I just realize anew
The biggest gift that I can have is knowing folks like you.
The author is Unknown (a writer who sure wrote a lot, but seldom gets proper credit) and it came to me tucked in a card from Bill Winegagar (who I met at Thule in 1991 . . . thanks Bill (though I suspect Kathy (his wife who I have not met) picked and included it). I've just spent the better part of two days figuring out how to make this advanced technology print mailing labels from my "address book" database . . . ain't technology wonderful? I could have typed them all on an ancient technology Royal manual typewriter in not more than ten percent of the time!
So, its now 11:00 A. M. on 21 December (the shortest day of the year: sunrise in Hosby at 8:46 this morning, and sunset at 3:51 this afternoon) and I'll be lucky if anyone receives this before 1996! Next is a quick review of 1995:
Besides working on the house (which is now considered an UNending task) I spent May and June in Turkey and Greece helping some Danish friends get their sail boat sea worthy and started on the long trip from Turkey to Denmark . . . Jonathan (my baby) and another Austin Texas Slacker joined the adventure, which turned out to be a lot more work in a very hot sun, than an adventure. All told, I invested two months of my life for about 150 hours of sailing the Med . . . of which only about 12 hours were truly enjoyable. But, the beaches are wonderful, the food is great and the locals' life is style laid back, relaxed and (in most cases) friendly. When the adventure began I intended to sail all the way back to Denmark if at all possible. Well, it just became impossible because I learned that sailing just "don't trip my trigger" like I thought it would. Though I didn't ever actually throw up I sure felt VERY "uneasy" in rough seas . . . so, I jumped ship in Athens. Jonathan went with me to Denmark where he helped work on the house (when his hurt-on-the-boat shoulder allowed) and celebrated his 25th birthday with a Danish style dinner party in July in honor of both his and Mette's process of aging. (His shoulder didn't hurts as he hoisted a good Danish brew and announced "skål" (I think the tobacco company spells it skol) to the party.
Just a couple of weeks after he left us (in mid-August) Mette and I flew away for two weeks on a Greek island. It was our honeymoon, since we had been married in March . . . Yes that's right folks, we finally did it . . . it was either that or I would have had to leave the country or become an illegal alien (can you imagine me as a "wet back"?) Anyway the date to remember is 26 March (I think) and wedding presents are being accepted. Then, right after our honeymoon we had a joyous addition to our little household. The blessed angel takes after both parents and is therefore BOTH cute and smart. And, if you look closely at the photo in the card you can see our little Molly patiently awaiting her picture to be taken . . .
Note: That is where the 1995 note ended . . . it was found in my word processor's directory, last accessed/changed on 24 December 1995 . . . it was never completed and never mailed to a single person.
Can you spell "procrastinator"?