The morning is damp and dark, a leftover from last night’s rain, but it is warm, 46°. I’m going to decorate today. I started yesterday by hauling my scrub pine tree from the cellar. I had to do it one step at a time and use both hands to hold it. I was afraid it was an accident waiting to happen but it didn’t. The tree is in the corner of the dining room, its usual spot, and is lit. I put a small tree skirt around the bottom. It grew legs and moved to the kitchen. I wonder how.

The tricky mouse is still on the loose. This morning the trap was empty and still had peanut butter. That mouse is a bugger.

Christmas has always been special to me. That started when I was a kid. I remember sitting at the kitchen table making ornaments. My mother had all the decorations, pipe cleaners, lace, ribbon, do-dads, bottles of Elmer glue and styrofoam balls, on the table. I remember I decorated what I imagined was an angel. Pipe cleaner arms held a small cardboard book of music. I made a halo, also out of a pipe cleaner. A few gems decorated the front. I even added hair made from string. I thought it a masterpiece. It was voted ugliest ornament.

I was good at decorating sugar cookies. My mother made the cookies using aluminum cookies cutters. We had Santa, a reindeer, a bell, an angel and a tree. My mother made the frosting and colored it red and green. She left some white frosting, beard white. There were small, round cinnamon candies for buttons. I remember using a toothpick to put lights on the decorated tree. I got artsy and added frosting string to connect the lights. I had come a long way from the ugly angel.

We made construction paper chains to circle the tree. We cut thin strips of paper, glued each strip to make a circle then glued the circle to the chain. I loved seeing anything I made on the tree. All pride aside, I even used to put my ugly angel on the tree. When I first bought my house, I had very little money left over after paying the mortgage. I did buy a tree that first year, but I had very few ornaments and only a couple of lights strands. I decide to make a construction paper chain. I glued the circles together and put them on the tree. The look looked so festive and colorful. I used to sit in the living room just to look at the tree.

I remember one night. I could hear the sound of paper. When I looked at the tree, I could see of some of the rounds had come apart. The glue hadn’t held. I took the chain off the tree and stapled the rings together and put the chain back on the tree. Disaster avoided.

My hand-made ornaments got better the older I got. I even made ornaments for Christmas gifts. My friends and family loved them. One year my mother gave me my award winning ugly angel. I put that on the tree every year.

Last night was downright cold. My car was covered in frost this morning. I gave thanks that I no longer have to scrape windows before work. The morning is already getting warmer. We are up to 42°. We’re having a heat wave. Where’s my Hawaiian shirt?

My dance card is filled with uke this week. Tonight is our Christmas party, Tuesday is practice, Wednesday my lesson followed by an afternoon concert and on Thursday and Friday more concerts. My house is nearly bare of decorations. I need to find time in between my uke events to Christmas my house. I’m starting today.

I’m the mouse in the maze, sort of. I set the trap yesterday morning. When I checked later, the peanut butter was gone and so was the mouse. I figured he was sitting in the cabinet full and happy. Being an eternal optimist, I refilled the trap. This morning, the sassy rodent had struck again. The peanut butter was gone. I made a couple of adjustments in the trap and reset it. I want that mouse. He’s mine.

Winter was inevitable. Even as a kid I knew that. It was the season of bundling. It was walking to school in the cold mornings and seeing my breath, my sort of personal winter, sort of icy, fog. The walk to school in winter was quiet. My friend and I whispered without even realizing. Frost covered parked car windows. Houses still had their lights on to counter the winter morning darkness. I remember how happy I was to get to school, to the warm building.

During my first year in Ghana, I was dreading Christmas, my first Christmas ever away from home. Nothing was familiar. Fir trees didn’t grow. Houses and streets weren’t decorated with lights. I heard no greetings of Merry Christmas. It was the harmattan, hot, dry days and cooler nights, no hopes of a white Christmas. I didn’t write home about what I was feeling, but I think my mother knew. She sent me a box of Christmas spirit. She and my aunt paid the postage to send it airmail, a not so small fortune. In the box was a fir tree, not tall but perfect regardless, decorations for it, some from the family tree, brick crepe paper to make a sort of fireplace, a small Christmas stocking, Christmas cookie cutters and sprinkles. In that box, I found Christmas. I could see it, but most of all, I could feel it.