Christmas Stream of Consciousness



 

Christmas Stream of Consciousness


Lighting, lights, relight, Christmas lights,

flashy ones, sparkling ones, shimmery ones...

Down the chimney he goes, chocolate chip cookies, crumbs, dusty beard, ruby smile, puffy lips, pearly teeth, pearls, laugh, jolly roll, cinnamon roll left for Santa.

He eats the sweets and washes them down with hot chocolate and mini-marshmallows that in reality my mom used to drink. Maybe they sat together, my mom chatting about her children as she stayed up with Santa, he listening with half an ear as he grabs for another cookie (fortunately diets never interested him and he kept his belly and jolly zest for life and cookies)

cookies with icing, cookies with red and green sprinkles, cookies cut into Christmas shapes by ingenious cookie cutters...

How I loved baking cookies with my mom, licking the batter, bantering about nothing...or did I? Perhaps I didn't speak at all. Instead, I followed my mom's instructions of levelling out the flour (which I don't do now) and baking soda. I smiled a missing tooth smile and shook short bangs as I reached a thin arm to stir the batter–thick, lumpy batter with chocolate chips...

Back to Christmas–it's always back to Christmas and the holidays because I'm back home, back to my childhood, back to a part of myself, back to hugs and loves and magic which is what I want in life

and Christmas songs, good cheer, music and caroling and frostiness...we see our breath and it bites our nose, we don't care about what it will do to our voices or losing them–just about the cheer and the holidays and the sheer joy of singing,

the warmth and garlands of my father's church which welcomed me even as an outsider, my Dad saying he felt blessed at my being there, others saying they felt blessed upon hearing my voice, singing at church, wanting to be there despite not knowing what I believe, the reflections of the stained glass on the walls, thinking maybe God lives there in the colors, maybe he/she lives in the colors or lights in my life like those I started with, 

full circle to lights again and hope and merriness and merriment.

Merry Christmas and Merry Light!


Photo: Bob SpringBob54: https://www.pexels.com/photo/glass-bauble-reflecting-christmas-tree-306864/

Text: Kristen Mastromarchi

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