2007-12-24

Christmas Eve was a lovely, fair, sunny, chilly day with lots of cold, gusty winds to make the air smell like wine. After Morning Offering Mick took on the work of cleaning the last of the leaves from our yard! Just as the cobbler’s kids go without shoes, our yard was the last to be cleaned, waiting until all his customers' yards were all neatened. Camelot looked very spiffy when he finished.

Meanwhile I ordered some work socks for Mick, looking in vain for cheap ones on www.sierratradingpost.com and finally settling for some socks on another site that looked sturdy and warm. I had to do this on Jim’s computer as my own laptop, Jenny Traveller, had Taken a Notion and was dead as a doornail. I also wrote my journals downstairs, and wore my back out sitting up. I am blissfully pampered, usually, by being able to tilt back a bit in my office mama chair and work on my laptop very comfortably despite my various aches and pains.

Fortunately Melissa came down from Avalon, having left plenty of food for the chickens, the bull calf and our newest animal, the cat. Melissa was softhearted and took a stray from the feed store, a tortoise-shell American domestic shorthair. By the end of the day we had settled on calling her Raffles. Raffles may well be pregnant, Mel says. Uh oh!! Nothing like being in the kitten business! As the Elk would say, “Beautiful!” But they will be good mousers, and heaven knows, field mice are abundant at Avalon!

Mel fixed my computer after we had a very restorative and delicious lunch together at Cheddars. Yum! This has been a banner week for good food. And tomorrow will top the bill, for sure!

It took the computer's battery about three hours to charge, and then was good as new. The problem was a loose connection from the surge protector into the wall socket. She suggests we upgrade that socket to make it three-prong and more secure.

Then Mel and Mick together performed the miracle of Christmas lights, putting icicle strips up along the front roof and porch top and stringing a line of colored lights all across our front and side hedges. From the street it looks wonderful, and it makes your heart lift to see all the lights and gaiety! Mick even found some blinking lights and decorated a cedar tree in the front yard with them to finish off the ensemble. It is great! Now we are ready for our guests tomorrow.

We three had a lovely evening, after Mick and I had our bath and a date, my amorous husband once again transporting us both to sacred beauty, pleasure and worship as we shared sexual energy. We came downstairs to rejoin Mel and watched a good episode – Christmas based of course – of CSI and then put on some jazzy Christmas music and played Scrabble. It was mellow and much fun.

Mick offered the closing prayer at the Gaia Meditation.