Jingle Bells

The weatherman promised sun for us today, but it never happened. We’ve been blanketed in a layer of fog since last night and the sun was never able to pop through.

I saw a flock of robins at the cemetery this afternoon. I suppose they were trying to decide whether to stay or go. I would probably tell them to stay, because we’re going to warm up some more, if we can dump the fog, and then cool down, and then warm up again. There is no snow in sight and the ground is as soft and moist as it is in the spring.

Stay, little robins. You’ll be fine.

We watched my across the street neighbor put up his Christmas lights this afternoon. He’s Ray’s age, 81 years old, and gets around pretty good. One of his daughters (he has five!) and son-in-law were there to help him. Ray had five daughters, too, but snuck in a son at the beginning of the line. Ray liked this neighbor and I like him, too.

I did Christmas decorating stages 2 and 3 yesterday. Stage 2 is decorating the house. I got rid of a ton of Christmas decorations last year and so this year, I have just enough to decorate and feel festive, but the house isn’t overwhelmed with all sorts of random Santas and reindeer.

Stage 3 is decorating the tree. I’ll still never forget Ray’s last Christmas in 2007. Usually, Ray and I decorated the tree together. I must have had the day off from work, because I remember dragging up the tree from the basement in the afternoon and decorating it before Ray came home from work. When he saw the tree was trimmed and decked out, he looked at me and said, “Thank you.”

I can totally understand, sometimes trimming the tree isn’t the wonderful thing we think it should be. Sometimes it’s just a plain old boring chore. And then other years, it’s a fun thing to do.

I didn’t mind doing it this year. Joe helped me lug the tree up from the basement, but he’s not the type of person to decorate, but that was OK. I took the time this afternoon to fill in some of the bare spots with additional ornaments.

My older grandson, Quincy, had a band concert this past week. He plays in the concert band as well as the jazz band. He plays the baritone. He originally played the trumpet, but was switched to the baritone, because they have a ton of trumpets and no bass clef instruments. He has a quick learning curve as far as music is concerned. He had a solo in the “Man in the Moon” piece.

My life is going on the same pace as it usually does, in spite of the Christmas season. I can’t think of anything to buy anyone, so that make take some store trips, something I dread. Surfing the net hasn’t given me any ideas.

The person who stole Ray’s flag from his grave now has a little Christmas tree set up next to their person’s stone. The stolen flag is still there.