After the Tree

Okay, I admit it.  After I took all the ornaments off the tree and packed them away in their tissues and pretty boxes, I fell into a deep funk.  For the past month, the evening view from my favorite spot on the couch had been this:

  

With the tree gone, the room felt bare.  No, not just bare--blank.  I'm guessing maybe you've had that feeling before, too.  I think I feel it more right now because we're living in an apartment and can't paint the walls or hang loads of paintings.  I like white and clean, simple lines without a lot of clutter, so I'm okay with that, but magpie that I am, suddenly I was really, really missing the sparkle.  

So I decided to put a bit back.  

I grabbed a string of white lights with a white cord and tied on lots of tulle bows to soften it.

Then, using a couple of map pins on one side and my old apple ladder on the other, I hung the lights over the little red stove.  It's not a forever kind of decoration, but a fun-for-January kind of twinkly bit of cheer.  

The little red stove leads me to one more note about light and sparkle.  I crave light all year long, but especially during the winter months.  One of my favorite ways to get it during the winter is from a fireplace.  Alas, the apartment has no fireplace.  What was a poor magpie to do?  I bought a very reasonably priced electric one just before Christmas.  I don't usually like the look of electric fireplaces.  They often seem fake and flimsy to me, but I found this one online at Plow & Hearth, and I love it.  I swear they're not paying me a commission, but maybe they should, since everyone who comes into my living room now wants this stove.  My mother and sister both bought one after seeing mine, and I know a few other people who are planning to buy them as well.  You can run the flames with or without heat,  and this little stove that could cheers up the entire room.  Best of all, the surface is always cool to the touch, so I can use the top to display a wooden bowl of pine cones--or whatever my magpie heart desires.  

I just thought I'd share this info in case anyone else would love a fireplace but can't have one where they are living.  If you have an old mantle, that would look fabulous with this stove, too.  I'm keeping my eyes peeled for the perfect one.  In the meantime, the tulle-dressed lights add a little whimsy, warmth, and shimmer to these cold January nights. 

New Year's Walk

It wasn't about resolutions or starting the new year right.  

It was just a walk.

It was just dried berries and salt air and reeds rattling in the afternoon wind.

It was just a squirrel finishing his supper before sunset.

It was just the black lace of bare trees tatted to pink satin clouds.

It was just the sun showing off her finest gown 

before she rode away over the mossy hills.

It was just a catch in the throat, a halted step, 

as night filled in the spaces 

between the branches of the apple trees, 

and we realized 

with wonder that we 

were not alone.

New Year's Poem

Tennyson wrote this poem more than a century ago, and its words seem as timely as ever.  Wishing you joy and peace in the new year.

In Memoriam, [Ring out, wild bells]
by Lord Alfred Tennyson

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
   The flying cloud, the frosty light:
   The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
   Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
   The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out the grief that saps the mind
   For those that here we see no more;
   Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

Ring out a slowly dying cause,
   And ancient forms of party strife;
   Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

Ring out the want, the care, the sin,
   The faithless coldness of the times;
   Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
   The civic slander and the spite;
   Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease;
   Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
   Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring in the valiant man and free,
   The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
   Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.