deep and crisp and even

--December 26th, 2007--
stockings

Merry Christ­mas! From Red Gate Farm.

It’s hard to believe we’ve been here five whole days, it’s been a blur. But a nice blur, lighted by can­dles and fire­light, enlivened by cold winds and washed down by oys­ter stew. And sprin­kled with nearly all the fam­ily we have, all in one place. It’s been lovely.

We arrived late Fri­day night to the usual mir­a­cle of the change in sea­sons when our backs were turned. It’s really odd to leave our cozy farm­house in early Sep­tem­ber, lay­ing down our ten­nis rack­ets, watch­ing the goldfinches dart in and out of the still-green oak leaves, chip­munks skit­ter­ing around in the green grass, and to return three and a half months later to… snow! A thick foot-deep blan­ket of per­fect white stuff stretch­ing out over the mead­ows. And no leaves on the trees! We can see from our bath­room win­dow upstairs straight across the road and to Anne and David’s frozen pond, a view that’s blocked by thick lilac bushes in sum­mer. And we can see our next-door neigh­bors across the meadow, a house that’s hid­den by enor­mous stands of oaks and birches in July and August. The pear tree full of still-hard fruit when we left? Bare, branches shin­ing in the full moon­light. Crazy!

But the house was far from neglected these months. Rol­lie the farmer had kindly shov­eled the dri­ve­way for us. Too funny: on the plane over, John laughed and said, “You know what, I had the fun­ni­est dream last night: that Rol­lie came and instead of shov­el­ing the snow, he just hacked it away with a giant back­hoe and took the lawn with it.” And when we woke up Sat­ur­day morn­ing, John laughed again, and said rue­fully, “A dream come true!” Not quite the whole lawn, but it was a bit of a blood­bath. Never mind, the kind­ness itself is worth the whole price of admis­sion. And Anne and David had left a bowl of clemen­tines (spe­cially for John’s par­ents, who were delayed a cou­ple of days unfor­tu­nately), and a fridge full of bread, soup, juice, eggs. And our beloved friend Olimpia saved our lives with a bas­ket of Eng­lish muffins, cran­berry bread and jam. Great friends, all.

More soon, but we are all cozy and happy this Box­ing Day. How’s London?

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