Sylvia's Journal

This morning when I woke up everything outside was white. We are in the middle of another snowstorm which is dumping many more inches on top of what is already on the ground. Just as I was wondering what sort of emergency would get anyone out of the house on a day like this, the newspaper delivery guy drove up to our house and threw the newspaper in a wide arc from his car window to our front door. It landed exactly at our doorstep. He certainly earned his Christmas tip this year. Ever since he saw the ramps appear at our house in late July he has gotten the newspaper within our reach; first by hand delivering it. This is rather unusual; most newspaper delivery guys throw the paper somewhere into the yard, never leaving their car, and many miss by a wide range or did not even aim for the doorstep.

Sita and Jim are stuck in Boston, with friends. It’s much better to be stuck with friends than on the road. Tessa was also supposed to be here by now. But after getting on the highway yesterday afternoon she realized that the same storm that is hitting us now had already arrived in her corner of Ontario, creating serious driving hazards. Having read about our commute from hell, she was wise to turn around and went back to wait out the storm. Now we have the house to ourselves. We can do whatever we want. We have dry wood in the fireplace, a big pot of tea and, so far, still electricity. This will be fun.

Yesterday our continuing soreness and muscle aches had made us both very irritable. We were like two snapping turtles and snapped away at each others’ bad habits. It made me think back about the lofty intentions of somehow being different (more perfect) after the accident. Why I thought that such ideas would last is now a mystery. We may be in our second life, but the accident was by no means a rebirth. We are the same people and the baggage we carry on our backs remains with us. It was only temporarily obscured by the trauma. As the trauma gets lighter and lighter, the old stuff begins to re-appear.

Luckily Roger invited us to come over and get our Christmas tree, which got us out of our snapping mode. The path leading to Roger’s trees was too hard for me to handle because of the deep snow. I stayed in the house with Sook, and had a cup of tea. Every year, in exchange for a mussel meal in the summer, we get to cut one of Roger’s trees. Of course this year’s payment did not happen. In fact it was Sook who cooked several times for us in our hour(s) of need. So next year it will be a double feature mussel meal.

Traditionally it is Tessa and Axel who are responsible for the Christmas tree. Frankly, I could care less. I like the trees better in their natural state, outside, where they belong without all the stuff hanging on it. Unlike the rest of the family, I am not flooded with happy childhood memories when I see a tree all gussied up. My warm fuzzy memories are attached to Sinterklaas on December 5. Besides, our living room is too small and our house too full and cluttered for something as big and wide as a tree. And it is not only the tree that enters. It comes with boxes and boxes of little tchotckees from Axel’s childhood, such as reindeer sets, made of the earliest plastic. Many of these old pieces are quite tattered and fragile, with ears or legs missing but Axel cherishes them as if they are the most beautiful things in the world. This has rubbed off on Sita and Tessa and they have added their kindergarten-made stuff to it. You cannot imagine the clutter; Santas, elves and reindeer everywhere! I try to stall the invasion as long as possible. I am often successful and the tree doesn’t enter until Christmas Eve. And within days after Christmas I start asking when we can pack everything up again and put the tree outside. Every year Tessa says that this year she’ll get the tree in early, but she rarely succeeds.

Katie-Blair joined us and chose a gigantic tree that dwarfed her car. The St. Johns have a big living room with a high ceiling and very little clutter. It’s easy for them to have a big tree. Besides, I don’t think they have all these tchotchkees.

Afterwards Roger and Sook took us to Erica Sonder, a fascinating German-born artist who makes exquisite prints of the flora around us after she mounts and dries the plants. This includes many different kinds of seaweed. We had already seen some of her pieces at the houses of friends. She lives on Ipswich neck, a piece of land I only know from the sky. It is beautiful but somewhat remote I imagine in weather like this, with nothing but snow and ice all around.

Axel cooked us a delicious shrimp curry. All the cookbooks in our house now have their shrimp recipes marked. We have many more pounds to consume. Afterwards we watched Harry Potter nr. 5 until my eyes closed. I don’t know how it ended, but since I know the end of Harry Potter nr. 7 it does not matter.