My friend Margaret Simon of Louisiana hosts the weekly Poetry Friday Roundup by posting a photo and inviting writers to compose a poem inspired by the photo. Last week, she visited the North Georgia mountains with her family as a Christmas gift to her children and their families, and she posted her cherished moments of making memories with them. She invites us this week to write a poem about this photo of her mountain house.
Margaret has been using the elfchen form, also called an elevenie, in which the lines fall into the sequence of 1 word, 2 words, 3 words, 4 words, and concludes in summary fashion with 1 word that ties it together. She will announce her One Little Word tomorrow, and hints that it may be the last line in her own poem (Connection), so I’m giving an enthusiastic nod to her choice by using a form of connection as the last word in my own poem. You can read her post here, along with other poems that were written about the photo, and her picture that inspires her poem (and others) is below:
Mountain House photo by Margaret Simon
Presence
unhindered
time spent
unhurried memory making
letting presence be presents
connecting
Try an elfchen! These are fun to write, and what a fabulous way to preserve memories – using photos and short forms of poems. I like the way just a few words can encapsulate an entire experience and bring all the memories and good times rushing back.
A special thanks to Margaret Simon for inspiring my writing today. Some of my greatest blessings are my writing community friends, who encourage and inspire me to be better.
At the end of each month for the past decade plus a few years, I’ve reviewed my yearly goals and spent time reflecting on how I’m living the life I want to live ~ a way of becoming my own accountability partner and having frequent check-ins to evaluate my progress. The process I’ve been using has been helpful in guiding steps of intentionality and observable differences – – it has put teeth of quantifiable measure in the conversations I have with myself whenever I might attempt to believe that I’m making progress and provided a way to articulate exact progress so that I’m not merely shuffling things back and forth and deceiving myself. I make a table, establish goals, and keep an accountability log of accomplishments and action steps through month-end reflections. I learned this system somewhere in my early years of teaching and it was reinforced by my doctoral chair, Dr. Rachel Pienta, who assured me that it would get me to the diploma at the finish line with fewer tears and less frustration.
She was absolutely right.
This year, though, I’m tweaking my process by a few degrees to get to the things in life I need to accomplish. Everything on my list is not an ongoing action goal – – some of these are aspirations, and I need to recognize the differences and prioritize my efforts. Weight loss is an action goal that needs quantifiable progress markers with a timeline. Downsizing and retirement planning needs quantifiable progress markers with a less strict timeline. But gardening and hobbies like knitting or quilting or canning fig preserves are not as high on the list of priorities, and they’ll fit in between the more challenging goals where time permits.
So this year, I’m using a different system. I’m evaluating my progress in bold areas monthly, and all other areas quarterly.
I’m looking through a proverbial viewfinder for the big areas of life where I need the presence of some focal lenses, and I’m thinking of the smaller aspects of those larger lenses as I adjust the diopter lens and take snapshots of my journey.
2024 underway, taking us on a new scenic journey. The conductor punched our tickets at midnight – – (and where we live in rural Georgia, our front door literally shook with a sonic boom from someone’s Tannerite explosion welcoming the new year).
It’s here, folks! Welcome 2024, and cheers to you and yours!
The Viewfinder
Optical Lenses of Focus
Diopter Lenses of Possibility
Snapshots of Success
Hobbies and Life Outside Work
Sewing, Knitting, Quilting Traveling and camping Gardening Birdwatching Monthly reading group with Sarah J. Donovan Writing with Ethicalela.com 5 times a month, and every day in April Writing with Two Writing Teachers at the Slice of Life Blog every Tuesday and every day in March Writing with Spiritual Journey Blogging group on Thursdays The Stafford Challenge – a poem every day starting mid-January Writing group book proposals
These columns will be shared as progress occurs each month or quarter.
For starters, I am sharing my blog post on Slice of Life today. And just like that, I’ve taken a step into 2024 with a hobby that I enjoy.
Weekly Dinners and game nights In Person Visits FaceTime Visits Group Texts Traveling together Celebrate Red Letter Days
Mental and Physical Health
Reach top of weight range (I know this number) by June 1 and maintain it throughout 2024
Walking
Hiking campsite trails
My Table of Plans for Focusing on Success
My One Little Word for 2024 is pray. Today’s diopter word is step. As I pray for 2024 to be a productive and fulfilling year, I must step into it with purpose, and take the steps necessary – to do my part – to make it a great year.
Last week, I presented a family member with a box of verbs to encourage reflection, guidance, journaling, and meditation on positive words and the actions they inspire. She used these words written on miniature Jenga blocks to select her One Little Word for 2024, choosing the word trust because she says, “It’s something I truly want to be able to do.”
When I think of selecting a word of the year, it’s challenging to choose only one. As a lover of words and all their nuances, it makes it even more challenging to parse out synonyms and all their shades of meaning. It’s like having that big box of Crayola crayons and being asked to choose one favorite color – – – only harder.
I really have trouble with that. I love the bright yellow sunshine, the crystal blue water, the spring green grass, the scarlet red cardinals, and the orange embers burning in the fire pit, glimmering with the heat like embers do. I want all the colors, and I want all the words.
Most of all, I want the verbs.
Not just any verbs. I want verbs that inspire positive action in my life and lead me along healthy paths.
After considering a few hundred words for 2024, I’m staying with my 2023 word for another year.
Pray.
I can’t think of a better word fit for me for the coming year. To pray without ceasing is to carry this word each day, each hour. On my way in to work each morning, I turn off the radio and follow the ACTS model of prayer, first offering Admiration, then Confession, then Thanksgiving, and finally Supplication. Mostly, I give thanks for the miracles of blessings received. But I also give thanks for the miracles of things that didn’t happen that I may never realize I was spared.
My friend Glenda Funk is taking the word care as her word for 2024. An article in The Washington Post encouraged her to choose a nudge word – a word that nudges her to live the life she wants to live. She writes in her blog post, “Care is a word I expect to push me to live the life I want to live in the coming leap year.” Fellow Slice of Life writer Sally Donnelly has selected the word prioritize, because she wants to keep the mantra, “Should this be a priority?” in focus as she chooses her path and all of her options.
When I read about all the words my friends choose, it gives me such joy when they share the reasons they’re choosing them. What is your One Little Word for 2024, and how did you choose your word?
At the end of each month, (or beginning), I review my yearly goals and spend some time reflecting on how I’m doing in living the life I want to live ~ a way of becoming my own accountability partner and having frequent check-ins to evaluate my progress. I’m still in the process of revising some of my goals as I encounter successes…..and setbacks. For the month of December, here’s my goal reflection:
Category
Goals
My Progress
Literature
Read for Sarah Donovan’s Book Group
Blog Daily
Write a proposal for writing group’s book
Sarah’s book club did not meet in December, so I started Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer and am hanging on every word. I don’t want it to end. I’ve completed I Hope This Finds You Well by Kate Baer for January’s book discussion, and I think Kate a genius for finding apt responses in her hate mail and flipping the script.
I continue to blog daily, and the daily writing and reflecting is a wonderful habit for me. I don’t feel complete without some form of daily writing, and the blog is a way of continuing the habit.
My writing group is writing a series of new books, and I will spend time sending our proposal out to some publishing companies. We are slow going at this, but we refuse to give up. I did not send out any proposals in December, but we met by Zoom and each decided to send to a couple more, so I need to get on that on the Tuesday and Wednesday before returning to work on Thursday.
Creativity
This goal did not happen in December. There was no creativity except in the making of a hat or two on a knitting loom.
Spirituality
Tune in to church
Pray!
Keep OLW priority
We still watch a variety of churches on Sunday – in Georgia, Kentucky, and North Carolina. We attended a Christmas Eve Service of Lights in Kentucky when visiting family there.
My car is still my prayer chamber for daily prayer, and there’s so much to give thanks for. I continue my conversations with the good Lord each morning and afternoon.
I’m still keeping my OLW my priority: pray!
Reflection
Write family stories
Spend time tracking goals each month
I have shared family stories through my blog this month. This will not be as much of a focus in 2024, but will continue sporadically.
I’m tracking goals, revising, and considering some new categories as I look at my goal table.
Self-Improvement
*Reach top of weight range
This is a true failure goal for me in the last 6 months of the year. The first six months was amazing. Then, we drove down Route 66 and had the coconut cream pie at the MidPoint Cafe in Adrian, Texas, and I haven’t stopped eating anything all year.
Gratitude
Devote blog days to counting blessings
I begin the days this way and end them giving thanks as well. Special occasion birthdays are often reserved as gratitude days on the blog.
Experience
Embrace Slow Travel
Focus on the Outdoors
In December, I’ve traveled within the state to two different conferences – one in Harris County, and one in Paulding County, both focused on Literacy. I have also traveled to see family in Kentucky and South Georgia, and our South Carolina family came to us. I’m about ready to hit the pause button on travel for a while, other than an occasional weekend of camping.
I’m still focusing on the outdoors with birdwatching on the farm so that I know which birds are prevalent during which months right here on the Funny Farm. I’m planning to shift partially to focusing on the indoors, paring down possessions so that we can, perhaps, by the end of the year, have a viable plan to downsize our home to a barndominium for our coming retirement years.
In the coming week, I will examine ways to keep monthly goals and the best ways to share progress quarterly. I’m also searching for the One Little Word I’d like to take with me through 2024. I will share that word in the coming week as well.
We are visiting my childhood home today – St. Simons Island, Georgia, on the 8-year anniversary of my mother’s death from Parkinson’s Disease. Although the family house where we grew up has long since been leveled and rebuilt, so much of the 1970s decade is still ever present here on the island.
When I was young here, the Tastee-Freez was the place we’d go on our bicycles to get ice cream and hot dogs. It has since been a Dairy Queen and now a Frosty’s, but the original poster is still hanging by the door.
I also love my brother’s dishes, which were our family dishes in the 1970s. This morning, I used a smaller coffee cup and a saucer than I would normally use, just to eat from these dishes. The retro vibe is strong on the olive green pattern.
It’s a welcome feeling to walk back through the decades. As we go through years of memorabilia with our dad, my brother and I are reliving memories and sharing the stories. Even though the annual “family meeting” is sometimes uncomfortable with the details of how families move forward after losing a loved one, it’s also filled with plenty of time around the table, enjoying great food and laughing.
As we move into a new year, laughter is a word that I’ve considered as my One Little Word for 2024. It’s surely something that improves my whole outlook!
We’re missing Mom today, but we know she is close. As my brother and I were driving this morning, a hawk flew directly over us – – a sure signal that all is well in Heaven.
From the Yule Log recipe notes: A French Christmas tradition that dates back to the 19th century, the cake represents the yule log that families would burn starting on Christmas Eve, symbolizing the new year to come and good luck ahead.
After baking the Yule Log cake and spreading and rolling it with heavy whipped cream in an inside whirl, my daughter went to work icing the cake to look like a tree log.
When her masterpiece was complete, she thanked me. ”Without you, I probably would have given up.”
Her comments stopped me in my tracks. I hadn’t offered much of anything other than simply being there. I’d been the one to make the mistake of flipping the frosting onto the floor. Fortunately, it had landed like Mount Crumpit, allowing me to scoop off the top of the mountain and then clean up what was touching the floor, saving what was usable for the bark frosting and discarding the rest – – while she stood there laughing (shhhh…..don’t tell anybody this part).
But it sure got me thinking about the Yule Logs of our lives and the teamwork we need to conquer their challenges to reach their summits. I thought of the lessons I’d learned.
Even if the Yule Log had been a complete disaster, the experience making it was the blessing. Togetherness in the kitchen is sacred, and things happen there that can’t happen anywhere else. There is conversation, laughter, mistake making, and forgiveness.
The one who reads the whole recipe and sees how overwhelming it will be may be less equipped than the one who has never read it and sees the whole journey as merely a series of small steps. Some of us work on long range plans, some on short range plans.
Sometimes supporting someone is just a matter of presence and encouragement – nothing more.
Just because she’d never made a Yule Log didn’t mean she couldn’t turn out a masterpiece. I’m pretty sure Michelangelo had never painted a Sistine Chapel ceiling before, either. He nailed it on the first attempt, and so did she. Not only was this Yule Log gorgeous, it was also delicious.
I need to stop counting the obstacles and focus on the possibilities. Dollar General sells $15 mixers on Christmas Eve, and they do the same work as the top of the line Kitchen Aid mixers. The gas oven is the same 350 degrees that an electric oven is. There are bowls that will appear out of nowhere when you need another one – some plastic, some metal, some glass. You get a second wind somewhere at the beginning of a long task, and it will see you through.
Without each other, we can accomplish much more than we can accomplish alone.
There is both starting power and staying power in support and encouragement from others to make it to the finish line.
When I wonder why I’m standing in a kitchen on Christmas Eve never having guessed I’d be making a Yule Log, that’s the time to listen for the lessons that life is sending my way through the blessings of my children. It’s in the unfamiliar, uncertain places where we draw on faith and learn our greatest lessons.
I need to do a better job of expressing to each of my children how very proud I am of each of them and how much I love them. They do things that terrify me and things that amaze me.
It isn’t luck or magic that is needed for any of this. It’s prayer and divine intervention, and they are not the same things.
In the years ahead, my hope is that the moments of making this Yule Log burn warmly, living on as embers that remind us that the living of life is in the journey, and it isn’t for the faint of heart. It takes each other, and it takes willingness and courage. It takes a lot of work, and there will be mishaps. It takes forgiveness and laughter. But most importantly, it takes faith, hope, and love.
8 O taste and see that the Lord is good: blessed is the man that trusteth in him.
At 8:00 p.m. on Christmas Eve, my daughter and I began our first-ever Yule Log baking adventure in our pajamas in a rural countryside VRBO kitchen that was unfamiliar to us. When our Kentucky family got together to plan the Christmas dinner, everyone decided to divide the menu and each prepare a dish. Ever so daringly and boldly, she volunteered us to bring a Yule Log. She’d found an ambitious recipe online and had shopped for all the ingredients. She measured them into bags and brought them to the rental house.
By the time we arrived back from the only open store, a Dollar General on the backside of nowhere, we were well into the Christmas Eve hours when children are tucked into bed and elves begin working their magic. And we needed more than magic. We needed divine intervention. Lots and lots of prayer – my One Little Word for 2023.
The recipe looked intimidating. We watched the video of the woman making it to try to ease my apprehension. So much had to go right, and I was fearful of a flop.
The old whipped-cream-on-the-nose baking pose
To ante up the challenge, we were using dishes that weren’t ours, cooking in a gas oven we didn’t know. The cardinal rule in baking is to “know thine oven,” and this beast was a complete and total stranger from another realm.
Somehow, though, after all the beating of the egg whites with sugar to form stiff peaks and folding in that mixture with the flour and egg yolk and cocoa, she pulled a perfectly baked chocolate sponge cake from the oven, ready to be inverted onto parchment paper and rolled in a thin white towel and placed in the coolest part of the room to set before spreading the heavy whipped cream on it and re-rolling it. My daughter was unflappable throughout the whole process, but my nerves were on edge the entire time. I was trying not to show it.
The cake is ready when it springs back into form when pressed
We watched the recipe video again when it came time to unroll the cake and spread the layer of whipped cream on the inside.
The entire process involved phases of blending, folding, baking, setting, cooling, spreading, rolling, unrolling, and waiting. It also involved a lot of laughing to keep the nerves under control. It felt a lot like walking across a landmine with someone who didn’t know we were on a battlefield with so many potential pitfalls.
As every step turned out, my daughter smiled through the entire process. She was baking a miracle as I stood amazed. Turns out, she hadn’t read the entire recipe before she started. Each small step was not overwhelming to her. I, on the other hand, saw every mile of the long journey and knew how risky it could be.
It came time for the rolled log to be iced, and her artistic flair came out in full force.
She evened out the chocolate buttercream frosting into consistent thickness and began her artistic presentation using a fork to make bark lines, even making an elliptical shape to make it look more knotty and authentic, like an owl might pop its head out at any moment and ask us whoooo we were. She softened a Hershey bar and began the tedious process of shaving thin chocolate curls with a sharpened knife. And she placed peppermints in a Ziploc bag and crushed them to look like shimmering snow to top the Yule Log.
And when her masterpiece was finished, she stood back and admired it with pride.
“Look what we did, Ma! Thanks for making it with me. Without you, I probably would have given up.”
I hugged her close, thinking, No, dear daughter. This is all your creation, not mine. I never would have even attempted it. You are far more courageous than I will ever be.
She inverted a mixing bowl to cover it like a cake lid and placed it in the refrigerator to chill overnight. I admired her accomplishment and thought of that Yule Log as a metaphor for all the ways we need each other.
And we hugged goodnight, looking forward to sharing it with family on Christmas Day.
One of my daughters volunteered us to make a Yule log for Christmas dinner. We were in Kentucky, checking in to a VRBO after our 6-hour drive and a Christmas Eve Service of Lights when I found out. Without a mixer anywhere in the cabinets, the bold yellow glow of a Dollar General open until 10 p.m. on Christmas Eve on the backside of nowhere offered a glimmer of hope for the first miracle we’d need to create this masterpiece of skilled baking and artistry I seriously doubted either one of us had – – except for her creativity. That was the only strong possibility we had going between the two of us.
The recipe said it would take 3 hours. It was 7:30. The second miracle we’d need would be wakefulness. A working oven (in this one, we’d be cooking with gas) and all the right pans and an assortment of mixing bowls would need a divine nod, too.
The irony is that just a day before, I’d seen a perfect Yule Log as I’d scrolled on Facebook. I admired the swirl, the spongy-looking cake, and the icing that looked like tree bark. Oh, to be able to make a thing like that, I thought to myself.
“Someday, when I’m retired and have more time and patience, I’d like to try making a Yule Log,” I shared with my husband, showing him the picture. He studied it for a moment, noticing its intricate design, and then studied me, handing the phone back. I think he halfway expected me to laugh, as if this were a joke. I didn’t.
“But what about all these different ingredients?” I asked my baking partner daughter. ”We may have a Dollar General, but we’ll never find a grocery store open after 6 on Christmas Eve.”
“No worries,” she assured me, holding up a bag filled with an assortment of Ziploc bags. ”I already have all that, already measured out. It’s in this bag, and everything is labeled, right down to the eggs.”
Sure enough, she came ready with the ingredient part. We added a jelly roll sheet pan and a roll of parchment paper to our buggy, along with the mixer. Then we thought of a can of Pam, a Hershey Bar to make chocolate curls, and some peppermints to smash for a top-garnish. We were ready to check out and go get busy on our baking adventure of a lifetime. On Christmas Eve.
At 8:00 p.m., we began the 3-hour baking quest.
“I’ll bet you didn’t think you’d find yourself making a Yule Log on Christmas Eve, did you?” she asked.
“This is not the first time I’ve found myself doing something I didn’t expect to be doing,” I reassured her with a smile of readiness for anything.
I heard my husband chuckling from the den, where he sat reading. ”Nope, it sure isn’t, and I’m sure it won’t be the last, either,” he added.
I enjoy reading Gladys Taber’s accounts of Christmases past, and today I am sharing some of her excerpts. As I reflect on the stillness of the Christmas season, here are a few of my favorites by Taber:
We always think of Christmas as a time of snow and icicles hanging from the old well and snow over the valley. But I had a friend who was newly married and went to live in the tropics. She felt sorry for herself as Christmas drew near. She wept. And then her husband brought in some tropical flowers, to decorate the house, he said. And it came to her suddenly that Christmas was not a place, nor was it weather, it was a state of mind. After all, she thought, Christ was not born in the North, he was born in a stable in Bethlehem. And so she got a small palm tree and put flowers on the flat leaves, and was gay and merry. It was, she said, one of the best Christmases ever, although they afterward moved back to New England where the snow fell and the pine trees were silvered.
…
It is certainly true that Christmas is only seasonal in the heart. The snow may be clean and deep outside, or you may be in a dingy city apartment, or you may be in a steaming tropical country. But it is still Christmas. Whether you serve the plump crispy turkey, or something exotic wrapped in pandanus leaves, the feeling of Christmas is there. It is in the mind and in the heart. The faith we have in the good rises like a tide and wherever we are, we feel it. Christmas graces any board and gives a new lift to our life, and as we hear on ce more the familiar carols, we thank God for the birth of His son. “O little town of Bethlehem, how still we see thee lie – Above thy deep and dreamless streets the silent stars go by.”
…
As always when the old house creaks into quietly, I snuff the Christmas candles and check to be sure nobody has left a turkey bone where the Irish could get it. The colored ribbons and tissues are swept up, the fire has died down, and I let the cockers and Irish out for a last run in the new-fallen snow. They take nips of it, roll in it.
>>>
And now, as always, I have a special reunion with my Honey, a golden cocker who died a time ago. I hear her paws softly padding beside me as I put the house to bed. I can see her golden feather of tail wagging happily. Some might say this is foolish for she was, after all, only a dog, and she is dead. But the fourteen years of love and loyalty she gave me are very much alive as I say, “Good night, Honey.”
The house talks, as old houses do. A beam settles. A chair rocks. A floor creaks with unseen footsteps. I like this, for it reminds me of all the lives that have been lived under this roof, and I feel their friendly presence as I poke the embers. Christmas is over. It is time to burn the wrappings, write the thank you notes, return the calls, set the house in ourder for the New Year. It is also time to consider where our lives are bound, what purpose steadies our course. How much have we helped our fellow men this year, and what good have we accomplished? Has the world been better because we were in it? If Christmas means anything, it means good will to all. I doubt manuy of us truly live up to that, but we can try again.
As I let the dogs back in, I smell the snow. The walk is silver, the picket fence wears pointed caps. Night herself is luminous with the falling snow. A flurry comes in with the dogs and melts on the wide floorboards. No two snowflakes, I am told, are exactly alike and this is a mystery. Now the intricate shapes are gone, and only a spot of water remains. It is not very practical to stand in the open door at midnight to let the snow blow in. But is has been my habit for years to close Christmas day just so, sending my blessing out to all the people in the world, those I know well and love greatly, and those I shall never see. And as I close the door, I repeat again my Christmas blessing. “God rest you merry, gentlemen.”
Common Threads 