I am eating a lot of penance soup these days.

Thanks to the gods who set the calendar for Albuquerque Public Schools, I have just enjoyed the longest winter break ever.  “Too much time off gets me in trouble,” my friend Patti often remarks, “I need the balance of work and play.”  Wiser words have never been spoken.

In the Ten Thousand Stars Studio, the holiday officially began when my last student walked out the door on Wednesday, December 14^th and my friend Lora and I got on a plane to Dallas for a long weekend.  This trip had been long anticipated, and even had acquired a name:  Amy and Lora’s Texas Tour of Christmas Crap.   Or, as we had begun referring to it: TTCC.

In a previous lifetime many years ago, Matt and I lived in Fort Worth.  We still have dear friends there who we try to see at least once a year.  I have a college roommate who lives in Frisco, outside of Dallas, who I always love hanging out with.  Last December, while Matt was still drowning in Christmas work, I went to Dallas to see these friends.  It had been years since I had been in Texas at Christmas, and I had forgotten how seriously Texans take the holiday.  I spent the weekend with my mouth hanging open:  there was not a surface left in the state that did not have a flashing light or a big red bow.  Wow!  I kept thinking to myself, this is really something.

Then one night I was out walking, taking in the merry Christmas lights in the neighborhood where I was staying, when I stumbled upon this sight:  a house (a nice ranch house on a very upper middle-class street, let me say) covered---and I mean COVERED—in lights.  On the roof was not one, but two full-sized displays of Santa and his reindeer, which I thought might be a bit confusing for the children.  In the yard was every possible Christmas character imaginable, life-sized and strung with flashing colored lights:  carolers, Frosty, Rudolph, a manger scene with wise men coming from all directions, even a Ferris wheel filled with stuffed teddy bears (who knows?).   But the piece de resistance was a carousel of horses, circling a Statue of Liberty.  That would be a Statue of Liberty.

I stood there for minutes, but could not begin to take it all in.  Staring at this circus cluttering this otherwise unremarkable house my first thought was, “No one is going to believe me when I tell them about this insanity.”   My second thought:  “Lora has got to see this.”  And, at that moment, Amy and Lora’s Texas Tour of Christmas Crap was born. 

Prior to our visit, Lora had barely set foot in Texas.  A good reserved New Englander, she had driven through Amarillo on her way to Albuquerque.  She had changed planes in Dallas and Houston a few times.  She had spent 24 hours with me in Lubbock.  But oh! There was still so many outrageous surprises awaiting her in this bigger than life state.  Especially in mid-December.   Especially in Dallas.

The TTCC was everything we had hoped for, living up and surpassing our wildest dreams.  We spent a day in Frisco with my college friend, Julianne, catching up and shopping.  (Oh!  The shopping!  Living as we do in a rather department-store-challenged state, the options—right there at your fingertips—seemed without limits.  Turned out, that was some precious insight for the whole holiday break, this healthy respect for reasonable limits, or rather, the lack thereof.)  We spent time with friends outside of Fort Worth, went on long morning walks, drank wine and coffee while watching the sun set and rise by the river, toured Christmas lights in the evenings—some set to synchronized music (Lions and Tigers and Bears:  Oh MY!) -- puttered around the square in Granbury, attended a holiday tea given in our honor, ate and drank too much, and generally were treated like royalty.  Everywhere we went someone was handing us more delicious food or offering us something wonderful to drink.  There was one day where I had eaten more by three o’clock in the afternoon than I had the entire previous week.  There was no stopping it:  it would have been like trying to halt a tsunami.

And as promised, Texas was decked in all her glory.  Even the house that sported the Lady Liberty did not disappoint.  It was, in every way, an extravagantly indulgent weekend. I left feeling a bit overstuffed with it all:  the endless eating and drinking; the time, energy, and money needed to maintain this level of merriment and décor; the sheer overabundance of the holiday cheer and, well, Christmas crap.   

I came home and began eating a lot of penance soup.

Penance soup is what Matt calls cabbage or leek soup, which I make and eat when I am feeling especially repentant about overindulgences of any kind.  Matt does not eat penance soup, as he is just generally a more well-balanced and moderate human being than I am.  Penance soup is best consumed with a general feeling of mindfulness (a bit of remorse mixed in never hurt) and thankfulness.  It is a good antidote, I have found, to the too-muchness that overtakes all of us during the holidays.  It levels the playing field a bit, and it certainly helps to counteract the tidal wave of good eating that is otherwise not just surrounding us, but rather drowning us all. 

And then, just when I was feeling a bit better about my world, the next gigantic wave of madness rolled in.

 

The next few days unfolded calmly enough, no sign of what to come.  Matt worked; I practiced, raked leaves, went to yoga class.  I swam laps and went on walks at dusk.  I mailed Christmas cards and finished my studio newsletter.  We had dinner with friends.  I read through a towering pile of books and drank pots of tea.  Our extremely simple Christmas display of lights, fish and angels twinkled merrily at us from the mantle.  There was peace and harmony throughout the land.

And then the next round of meals began.  My parents drove in from St Louis.  Lora’s mother arrived from Massachusetts.  We concocted big dinners involving cranberry roasts, smoked turkeys, two kinds of mashed potatoes, roasted vegetables, cheeses, homemade cookies, cheesecakes, chocolates.  Moderation went out the window.  I was mindful, all right:  mindful of how much I was eating and drinking.  The house was bursting:  with people, wrapping paper, boxes of homemade fudge.  It was all lovely, but I began to feel like I was drowning again.  To add insult to injury, my head wouldn’t stop pounding.

Just when I was about to shoot off emergency flares (or at least move to a hotel for a couple of days, or a monastery), everyone left.  Matt and I had a few days of quiet.  I cleaned out closets, made cabbage soup, took books back to the library, practiced Bach, and generally felt repentant with every bite of penance soup. 

But, of course, the holidays were not yet over.    

Even if it keeps you up all night,

wash down the walls and scrub the floor

of your study before composing a syllable.

Clean the place as if the Pope were on his way.

Spotlessness is the niece of inspiration.

 

The more you clean, the more brilliant

your writing will be, so do not hesitate to take

to the open fields to scour the undersides

of rocks or swab in the dark forest

upper branches, nests full of eggs.

 

When you find your way back home

and stow the sponges and brushes under the sink,

you will behold in the light of dawn

the immaculate altar of your desk,

a clean surface in the middle of a clean world.

 

From a small vase, sparkling blue, lift

a yellow pencil, the sharpest of the bouquet,

and cover pages with tiny sentences 

like long rows of devoted ants

that followed you in from the woods.

 

-Billy Collins

In my mind, 2011 will always be the year of the betta fish.  

I love that this year, the white crocheted angels and bells, dried cranberries and candles on the mantle had to make room for a couple of fish. It seems a lesson in remembering to expand our worldview, to grow a bigger heart, to make space for the simple joys in a too full life.

In the spirit of honestly, I must confess that Ping, Pang and Pong have all mysteriously died.  So have 2Ping, 2Pang and 3Pong. This is not the fault of the two felines that live here.   They could not care less about the fish swimming merrily inches away from their little paws.  So much for entertainment.

It was bittersweet getting the angels and bells out this December.  My grandmother who made them died last April after several years of deteriorating health.  She made the bells for our wedding reception 18 years ago, the same year her husband—my grandfather—died on Christmas Day.   When I look at the mantle decorated with her handiwork, I think that she would be pleased at the sight:  angels, bells, and fish all crammed together happily. 

During the last few years of Grandma’s life she didn’t know any of us.  Sometimes she talked, chattering of nonsense, putting together people and events in strange combinations.  The last time I saw Grandma, she was lost in the recesses of her confused mind.  She seemed excited to see me, seemed to know that I was someone important to her, but who I might represent on the family tree was long gone.  

After lunch, Momma and I wheeled Grandma through the garden and coming back through the lobby of the nursing home where she was living, we passed the lovely grand piano.  In the years since Grandma had been living in there, I had made it a habit to always play the piano when I came to visit.  Grandma couldn’t care less about the music, but she used to stop every single person walking through the lobby and announce loudly, “That is my granddaughter.”  

Passing the grand piano that last day, I suggested that I play.  “Someone might enjoy it,” I told Momma, “even if Grandma won’t know the difference.”  We pushed Grandma’s wheelchair right up to the piano and I sat down.  Suddenly Grandma grew agitated. Leaning toward me, she whispered, “Amy used to play this piano.”

Not only are the cats not interested in the fish, furthermore they have taken no notice of the wooden manger scene I set up at the beginning of Advent.  When they were kittens, this display with its little cows and sheep were like cat toys.  We lost Mary, the Queen of Heaven, that year, thanks to Godiva, which forced us to display the manger with two daddies—Joseph and a random wise man.  While I liked the inclusive spirit, I was thrilled to find Mary many months later while moving furniture for a painting project.  Today every character sits on its shelf, untouched by the cats.  We are all growing mellow in our old age.  

Perhaps, now that I think about it, that, and not the fish after all, is the defining characteristic of this year:  we are growing more mellow, our rough places being made smooth with time and age, our lives feeling more precious and dear with every passing year.  

Wishing you a peaceful, joyful, sweet 2012. 

I was not the only one struggling with discerning the truth about life last month. Apparently, in one of the kindergarten classes at a nearby elementary school there has been much concerned discussion about the existence of Santa Claus. I know this because I have a student in this class, Annette. For weeks, as she played her Christmas tunes for me, Annette would puzzle out loud about how Santa Claus was going to get into my house. "Is your fireplace real?" she asked one day. When I responded that it was a fake fireplace, she assured me that "Santa could use the front door." Meanwhile her classmates have been trying out the theory that perhaps Santa is actually mom and dad. I hope not. I may need to find some space in my life, but I am not ready to give up the idea of Santa Claus.

Elizabeth is 7-years old and completely unpredictable. She has been working on Rudolph, which is rhythmically challenging for a little one. In fact, it has been rather touch and go, pedagogically, which is the often the case when we tackle Christmas tunes. Often, I view the playing of Christmas music as an opportunity to introduce certain rhythms, knowing that for the beginners these might be more advanced than they are ready to take on. Oh well, I usually think, come January we can put these behind us for awhile, no harm done one way or another. As far as Elizabeth goes, I suspect she has been picking out more notes by ear than actually reading the rhythms, but in the last lesson she had appeared to turn a corner. I complimented her on her hard work. She interrupted, her little face screwed up in disgust, "I know, but I don't like those 'mess-ups'." 

This reminds me of another young kid with an already healthy respect for accurate performance practices. Last week Kyle stopped in the middle of his eight measure ditty and announced to me, "I am going to start over because that was just full of mistakes." 

We are doing winter/Christmas compositions in the studio these days. Last Wednesday I assigned Luke to do a composition about bells. To start his creative thinking process I asked him, "What happens when a bell rings?"

"An angel gets his wings," he answered confidently.

Tuesday Julie came into her lesson just as Anthony was finishing playing his final piece for December, a rowdy version of "Jingle Bells." As he is leaving, slamming the door behind him, Julie turns to me, "Miss Amy, how come he got to play 'Jingle Bells' and I got stuck with 'Away in the Manger'?" 

On Annette's last lesson before Christmas she lost her first tooth. "How will the tooth fairy get in your house?" I asked her, wondering if while working out Santa's escape routes she had considered the tooth fairy. It was clear by her expression that she had not. "Maybe flies in the window?" She suggested, thereby closing the door of that mystery for another day. 

Maybe flies in the window.   May Santa and the tooth fairy bless you, however they get in the house.  May your holidays be mistake-free.  May there be thousands of bells ringing, and angels singing.

Merry Christmas to all.....

Oh the weather outside is frightful....