Tag: Holidays

Christmas for cowboys and cats

Posted on by KMClantoren

I don’t really celebrate Christmas as a religious thing, but I do celebrate it culturally. I love the festive decorations, the hope for kindness and light, the focus on loved ones and giving. Even in difficult times, there’s still something for me to enjoy in this season with the people around me.

Sarah’s favorite Christmas song is a John Denver and the Muppets song whose lyrics begin with:

I don’t know if you believe in Christmas
Or if you have presents underneath a Christmas tree
But if you believe in love
That will be more than enough
For you to come and celebrate with me
For I have held the precious gift that love brings
Even though I never saw a Christmas star
I know there is a light I have felt it burn inside
And I have seen it shining from afar

I absolutely detest most Christmas carols, but I love that one.

(My long-running hatred for Christmas carols has many, many roots. I’ll hate them less when stores play fewer of them and when the recordings of them improve. I’m not holding my breath.)

So in the spirit of the season, Sarah and I decided to try to do a Christmas tree again this year. We have struggled to put one up since we brought Tadashi into the house at the end of 2019 because, frankly, we don’t trust the little bugger with it. One year, we put up the tree and lights and no ornaments and he still climbed into it every day. One year we did a couple ornaments and he pulled half of them off. And I lost count of how many times he tried and succeeded at knocking the thing over.

He’s 12 pounds of mischief and he’s a cat. What did we expect?

But in the new condo, there’s a really nice spot for a tree near the door to the second bedroom, and that door allows us to anchor the tree by tying it to something through the crack of the hinge so at least it can’t be pulled completely over.

It’s been a journey. At first we just put the tree up, nothing on it.

Tadashi climbed it and started chewing on every branch he could reach.

We tried to block off the bottom, but that got too annoying to deal with AND Tadashi just moved the stuff to get back to the branches.

So we sprayed the tree with something that smelled funny in the hope it would drive him off.

Nope.

Then I gave up and took the bottom row off the tree. It’s a fake tree, decades old, that my mom gave me years ago. It’s the kind where each branch has a hook on the end you stick into the metal pole up the center. So we removed the entire bottom row.

And guess what? Tadashi couldn’t quite reach it to chew on it.

Also, he didn’t like climbing into it nearly as well because the second row from the bottom has fewer branches and they’re less steady.

Is it keeping him completely out of the tree? No.

But it’s an improvement.

(Tadashi likes the tree. He did not like being Lion King-ed in front of it for pictures.)

Returning to the season, though, and also returning to John Denver, a friend of ours took us to see the John Denver: A Rocky Mountain Holiday performed by the MN Orchestra. I really didn’t know John Denver until I met Sarah, who gave me a thorough crash course in his music back in college. Now those songs are staples of our music library. Of course, John Denver himself is tragically long gone, but the performance was put together by his estate and former bandmates and included a ton of footage of him performing the same songs live. It gave it a wonderful, bittersweet feeling of loss and hope. I genuinely cried through most of the performance.

And yeah, I rolled my eyes at the songs with religious themes that don’t hold meaning to me. I didn’t sing along on “Silent Night” or “O Holy Night” and things like that because those songs aren’t for me. But I sang “Annie’s Song” to Sarah and laughed along with her and our friends on “Grandma’s Featherbed” and nearly shouted my way through “Take Me Home, Country Roads” along with the audience.

The thing about this season is that not every part of it belongs to me, but that doesn’t mean I don’t have a place in it. I can leave the Christian part aside and enjoy the hope and the spirit and Santa Claus. I can skip the songs about Jesus and sing about peace.

I think, especially now, finding commonalities with the strangers around me is maybe the best thing I can do with myself. More than ever, I think I need to focus on how we are all alike, not how we are different.

I’ll leave you with a few more words from John Denver and the Muppets:

For the truth that binds us all together
I would like to say a simple prayer
That at this special time you will have true peace of mind
And joy to last throughout the coming year

And if you believe in love
That will be more than enough
For peace to last throughout the coming year
And peace on Earth will last throughout the year

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Night falls, the world goes still

Posted on by KMClantoren

I’m still here, and in spite of the lack of blogging, I’ve been busy.

First and foremost, I’m still working to finish the YA fantasy novel. I got to about the 70% mark and hit that point of doubt that so many other writers talk about. One of my favorites is this essay by Neil Gaiman. It is just so comforting to know that a master of the craft hits a point of “nobody will ever read or care about this and there’s nothing good about it” the way I do! It took a 2-hour rant to Sarah for me to figure out my issue.

Sometimes I just get stuck; I think all writers do that. For me, sometimes the stuck is mental/emotional fatigue and I just need to take a break from writing. Sometimes it is my own doubt throwing up a boulder in my way and I need to shove it aside so I can keep going. And sometimes that stuck is a sign that there is something wrong with my story and I have to stop to figure it out. I know other writers who just write and solve their problems as they go, but that’s rarely worked for me. I like an outline, a chapter-by-chapter sketch of my scenes and beats. And sometimes the outline I have isn’t the one I should be telling.

This time, it was very much that. And the only way I get loose is to sit down and talk it out. Out loud at Sarah, usually. She’s very patient. I begin at where I’ve stopped and work backwards, twisting and turning the story like a Rubik’s cube. I question my characters, their motivations, their plans. If I had been assuming X is a villain for Y reason, I extrapolate how the story changes if X isn’t a villain, or if their reason isn’t Y anymore. I leave nothing untouched, perfectly happy to rewrite everything not yet on screen and anything already in the text. And after 2 hours (and, for some reason, it is ALWAYS 2 hours), I find my way to the right twist that lines up all the blocks and the Rubik’s cube is complete — and so is my outline.

So, plus side, now I have a path to the end that I’m excited about, that does several things I really wanted to do and didn’t know how, that feels like the right conclusion for everyone while yet leaving plenty of threads open for sequels. Now I just have to write it all down.

Second, I’ve been querying. Sadly, nothing to report. But I’m not feeling discouraged. My list of agents to query is long and full of amazing people I would be thrilled and honored to work with on my journey. The rejections aren’t landing as painfully as they did on the last book I queried, and I think it’s because I’m in a better place for myself. Also, I have a better relationship with my writing vs with the business of publishing. I know this isn’t my only shot. I’ll keep writing books. There’s no deadline to finding my way here. The process does take up effort and spoons, but I’m okay expending them and I feel hopeful and excited still.

Third, work is a lot, but nobody comes here to read about that.

(Nobody comes here to read anyway, but I appreciate you if you find me someday!)

Fourth, we have been watching A LOT of hockey. With the Buffalo Sabres, the Minnesota Wild, and the Columbus Blue Jackets — and a subscription to ESPN+ — there is usually at least one game a night, and often two. They’re not all *good* mind; all three teams are struggling this year. But when they play well, even if they lose, they’re fun to watch. And with college football ramping down, having hockey is a constant source of excitement and fun.

Fifth, it’s holiday season, so there’s a lot to do. I hosted Thanksgiving for 9, watched the parade (of course!), and basked in the afternoon of good food and better company. Sarah and I even got our gift shopping done already! We have a million things to wrap and send, but at least we don’t have to figure out any more presents. Are we going to bake this year? Make cookies or something special for Christmas Day with friends? Who knows! Not me, anyway. It depends how we feel about it next week, probably. But maybe!

Lastly, it’s the part of the year where it gets dark early and stays dark long into the morning. Every part of my body thinks I should be hibernating right now, and naps are common. I also find that I’m more introspective and less outgoing as the darkness descends. I like this time of year, the cold, the quiet, the stillness. I like the night of the soul leading to the solstice and the celebration of Yule when the light returns. There’s a peace in the solitude of the late nights lit only by our electric fireplace and my laptop. It’s restful, and restorative, but not very productive.

If you want to find me being active these days, visit me on BlueSky. It has replaced the bird site for me, and while I’m not much more prolific there than I ever was on Twitter, I’m making some attempt to have a presence. Of course I’m still here, too, but I don’t really post memes here and such. I figure if you want the silly, it’s going to be on the spur-of-the-moment site. This is the long-form me, and I am inherently less amusing at length.

Anyway. I’m here, I’m writing, I’m doing okay. I’m busy, and my attention is going many directions at once, but I’m centered and grounded where it matters. And although we’re not quite to the point of looking ahead to 2024, the view from here has some light on the horizon.

As this is a season where there are almost no songs written for me and my spiritual affiliation (I do not do Christmas carols), I thought I would share this one instead. This is a wonderfully entertaining meditation on that space between traditional religious music.

I give you “Atheists Don’t Have No Songs” by Steve Martin:

Stay safe, all!

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Happy Halloween!

Posted on by KMClantoren

I’ve written before about what Halloween means to me, but it is also a time of great stress because it corresponds with one of my busiest weeks at work out of the whole year. Oct 31st itself tends to be a day I’m working until 10pm at night.

So, given that kind of day, I wanted to at least have a little bit of fun. Thanks to an amazing creator on Etsy, I was able to be a unicorn for the day!

It was surprisingly comfortable, not at all annoying, and will DEFINITELY be making an appearance in my cosplay for CONvergence 2024!

Me with a unicorn horn apparently sprouting from my forehead. The horn spirals up from my forehead to a point, about 4 inches long in total, and a sparkly starlight color. My hair is down and curling and I am grinning widely

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MLK Day 2019

Posted on by KMClantoren

More than ever, I think the only way for me as a person with the privilege of white skin can respectfully approach remembrance for Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr is not to speak, but to listen. Racism is real, it is pervasive, and it is incalculably damaging. As a white person, it is my responsibility to make space for non-white voices, to listen to them, to heed their insight, respect their experience, and learn from their wisdom.

So, in respect and solidarity, to celebrate this remarkable, brilliant, sorely-missed man, I offer only this:

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Closing 2018

Posted on by KMClantoren

Well, we’ve reached the last blog post of the year. I might have had more to say, but most of my energy has been stolen by a strep mimic. That’s an AWESOME way to end the year.

Anyway.

I don’t celebrate Christmas as a religious festival, though I do celebrate it culturally. For me, this time of year is the celebration of the darkness returning to light, of the cold to come which leads to warmth, of the death of the past year which will be reborn into the next. Even if the coldest days are ahead of us (and they are, at least in Minnesota), the darkest are over.

Other than “Carolyn’s Party,” there aren’t a lot of great songs for this time of year that really speak to me. So I’ll leave you with a more generic celebration of life and the earth and the cycles that connect us all.

I wish you all a peaceful end to 2018. May 2019 be blessed and beautiful and better than 2018 by far!

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The Light Through the Window

Posted on by KMClantoren

(I’m exhausted after the Twin Cities Women’s Choir concerts on Saturday, so this is going to be short.)

Illuminations is always such an important time for me. Since I don’t celebrate Christmas in a religious way (just cultural), my own feelings in the dark of the year are fed not by carols in the street and a hundred lit trees in the mall, but by the time spent with my musical community to contemplate the darkness, the growing shadow, and the light that comes after when the night finally gives way.

It’s an apt metaphor even in bright, effortless days. And these days, when the world seems darker than ever, that brightness has to come from inside us.

So it was worth every sore muscle, every aching inch of my feet, and my very unhappy knee, to spend a day on the risers with 100 sisters singing songs about the colors and lights that fill the world when shadows hang dark and heavy over us. And, yeah, I cried a couple of times because I do that. I’m sentimental. I always cry.

But there’s just something that happens when we raise our voices up together, beating back despair and cold with nothing but will and courage and joy and harmony. Anyone who has performed knows that feeling, and anyone who hasn’t never could. Suddenly, it’s like you are no longer just one. You are every person in the room, singer or audience or director, and you are complete, because your voice is one of so many.

And if I ever catch up on sleep, I’ll have an inner light well-kindled again to get me through the next few dark weeks.

I give you this song by Ann Reed. The choral group singing in the background is actually Encore from the TCWC, Sarah and myself amongst them. We were invited to sing with her for this album, and it just so happened that we got to sing on my 2 favorite songs she recorded. I can’t hear this song without thinking about the choir, or about my group of people who are friends and family and home. And in the dark, they are the light in my window.

“When a small quiet few sat together —
Faces she knew and had spent
A season’s for worse or for better;
She raised up her glass then to them.

And she said, ‘You’re my friends,
And wherever life takes me or when,
You’re my home, that’s the truth,
And the light through the window is you.’

So bring your lamps and lanterns here
On this last darkest day of the year.
Let our hearts be burning bright —
Through the window, I see you tonight.”

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Downswing

Posted on by KMClantoren

So, I hit a downswing last week.  I warned you at the start, didn’t I?  That sometimes things would go sideways because sometimes my brain decides to shake itself all out of balance and all I can do is hold on for the ride?  Well, sometime last week, apparently my happy brain chemicals decided to check out for a while and here I am in a downswing.

They’re all different, at least for me.  I’ve never been inside anybody else’s head, of course, but for me, every round of depression is different.  Sometimes they’re violent and frightening, like a storm in my head and I’m never more than a half-breath away from breaking out sobbing.  Sometimes they’re so subtle, so sneaky I don’t even realize I’ve slipped into Downswing Bizarro World until they let up and I look around and go “huh, that’s different.”  Sometimes they’re insidious, with a hundred little voices filling up my thoughts, pretending to be me, pretending to speak truth, and telling me every second every awful thing they can come up with to cut into me.  Sometimes they’re more physical, the symptoms manifesting like a cold or PMS, and I’m just tired and achey and not sleeping and everything else like being down with a cold minus the cold.

This one has been part physical and part mental.  The physical aspect has been draining. My energy reserves have been low no matter how much sleep I got or how much I ate or how much I rested between other things.  It was an effort, mental and physical, to get up and do something, anything, and then an impossibility to do more than one; I’d sit back down and have to start all over again.

The mental part has been some mix of the constant voice of self-hate and a propensity to be easily overwhelmed and need to escape.  Which was kind of terrible timing.

Since we had planned to have 18 people in the house on Sunday for Ostara.

I don’t celebrate Easter — not being Christian will do that.  But I do celebrate Ostara, and I invite my Clan, my family-who-are-friends-who-are-family to come join me.  Sarah and I cook a bunch of food, hide plastic eggs in the yard, and prepare baskets of chocolate and goodies (and other non-food goodies for those who prefer) for everyone.  And everyone else brings something to share and games to play, and we take a whole afternoon and evening to eat and have fun and spend time together. The kids come, too, and they get their own egg hunt, and then the last few years they’ve vanished into one room to play Legos.

I couldn’t actually tell you how I got the house ready for Ostara this year.  I always get less tidy when I’m heading for and then in a downswing, and this was no exception.  But, this time, I had to fight almost to the point of tears to get up and do things, from the grocery run to setting up chairs.  It was maddening and exhausting and I truly didn’t think I’d manage it. Even with Sarah helping as she could, there’s a freaking metric ton of work to do for that many people in the house.  Cleaning, cooking, organizing…

But then, this is my Clan, my family.

And the truth is, if I’d failed, it would have been okay.

If I had needed to cancel Ostara completely, they’d have understood.  If I’d been okay to host, but couldn’t do the food, someone else would have taken it over for me.  If I’d not been able to set up chairs, someone would have come early to assist (as it is, a few people did come early and they mopped the kitchen for me).  If I’d left the house a mess, everyone would have been fine. There would have been no judging, no disapproval, no blame.

Because this is my Clan, and they are amazing.

I spent a huge portion of the party in whatever room was quietest.  Games happened at our big table upstairs, and I hid out in the downstairs with the people not playing games just talking.  And that was easier than being surrounded by noise. I played with the kids a bit, but less than other years because to have the energy to be good with them was simply beyond me.  I didn’t fuss over the food or the mess once things got going, and I didn’t worry about if everyone was individually fine or having fun or happy. I just…settled into a comfortable niche and let everything else go.

And it was all okay.

I wish everyone in the world had a family like this.  I wish every family was like this. This Clan of mine…it’s based on trust, on respect, and on love.  And there is room for us all to be whatever and whoever we need in it — and we’re all okay with that. So if I am having an off week, or if someone gets horribly sick, or if someone needs help, it’s all fine.  Nobody can be everything to everyone, but there is probably somebody in this group who can be what someone else needs for a little while.

All I really needed on Sunday was to be around my Clan, to sit at the side and see them playing together and having fun, and to know that I was perfectly safe, that I was wanted, that I was loved.  That’s all I needed. And that’s what they give me.

My family is the BEST.

The downswing goes on and I’m as tired and downtrodden and self-hating as I was before, but I know it’s okay.  I know it’s temporary, it’s Brain Out-of-Order Come Back Later time, and it’ll pass. I know that if I get in a jam I can’t handle, or if things go so far sideways I’m falling down, there will be a boatload of people I can reach out to for help, and one of them will come.  I know that tomorrow may not be better, or the day after, but that ‘better’ is out there. And I just have to hang on until I stumble on it.

And one day I’ll open my eyes and go, “huh, that was different” and it will be over.  And I might be annoyed that I missed Ostara and had to spend it in a downswing, but even that is okay.  Because my Clan will be here next Ostara, and the one after that, and all the parties in between. My family isn’t going anywhere, and neither am I.

My downswings are sine curves, so they never truly bottom out and fall off the graph.  They can go pretty damn far down, but not forever. At some point, the graph will curve and I’ll be heading up above the suckitude again.  And, in the meantime, even if it feels like falling, I won’t hit bottom. I’ve got too many people to catch me.

And even my downswing brain can’t take that away from me.

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More Precious, Indeed

Posted on by KMClantoren

In college, I took an entire course on the political philosophy and thought of the Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr.  I have so many copies of speeches and letters and articles, excerpts from books and the books themselves, and, of course, the very famous Letter from Birmingham Jail, 1963.  But to honor this man, his work, and the dream he stood for — the dream we are still chasing even today — what I would like to highlight are some passages from his acceptance speech on receiving the Nobel Peace Prize on December 10, 1964 (as provided by the Nobel Foundation online, reproduced verbatim).

The words belong to a truly magnificent man.  The emphasis is my own.

I accept the Nobel Prize for Peace at a moment when 22 million Negroes of the United States of America are engaged in a creative battle to end the long night of racial injustice. I accept this award on behalf of a civil rights movement which is moving with determination and a majestic scorn for risk and danger to establish a reign of freedom and a rule of justice. I am mindful that only yesterday in Birmingham, Alabama, our children, crying out for brotherhood, were answered with fire hoses, snarling dogs and even death. I am mindful that only yesterday in Philadelphia, Mississippi, young people seeking to secure the right to vote were brutalized and murdered. And only yesterday more than 40 houses of worship in the State of Mississippi alone were bombed or burned because they offered a sanctuary to those who would not accept segregation. I am mindful that debilitating and grinding poverty afflicts my people and chains them to the lowest rung of the economic ladder.

Therefore, I must ask why this prize is awarded to a movement which is beleaguered and committed to unrelenting struggle; to a movement which has not won the very peace and brotherhood which is the essence of the Nobel Prize.

After contemplation, I conclude that this award which I receive on behalf of that movement is a profound recognition that nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral question of our time – the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to violence and oppression. Civilization and violence are antithetical concepts. Negroes of the United States, following the people of India, have demonstrated that nonviolence is not sterile passivity, but a powerful moral force which makes for social transformation. Sooner or later all the people of the world will have to discover a way to live together in peace, and thereby transform this pending cosmic elegy into a creative psalm of brotherhood. If this is to be achieved, man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.

The tortuous road which has led from Montgomery, Alabama to Oslo bears witness to this truth. This is a road over which millions of Negroes are travelling to find a new sense of dignity. This same road has opened for all Americans a new era of progress and hope. It has led to a new Civil Rights Bill, and it will, I am convinced, be widened and lengthened into a super highway of justice as Negro and white men in increasing numbers create alliances to overcome their common problems.

I accept this award today with an abiding faith in America and an audacious faith in the future of mankind. I refuse to accept despair as the final response to the ambiguities of history. I refuse to accept the idea that the “isness” of man’s present nature makes him morally incapable of reaching up for the eternal “oughtness” that forever confronts him. I refuse to accept the idea that man is mere flotsom and jetsom in the river of life, unable to influence the unfolding events which surround him. I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality.

I refuse to accept the cynical notion that nation after nation must spiral down a militaristic stairway into the hell of thermonuclear destruction. I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word in reality. This is why right temporarily defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. I believe that even amid today’s mortar bursts and whining bullets, there is still hope for a brighter tomorrow. I believe that wounded justice, lying prostrate on the blood-flowing streets of our nations, can be lifted from this dust of shame to reign supreme among the children of men. I have the audacity to believe that peoples everywhere can have three meals a day for their bodies, education and culture for their minds, and dignity, equality and freedom for their spirits. I believe that what self-centered men have torn down men other-centered can build up. I still believe that one day mankind will bow before the altars of God and be crowned triumphant over war and bloodshed, and nonviolent redemptive good will proclaim the rule of the land. “And the lion and the lamb shall lie down together and every man shall sit under his own vine and fig tree and none shall be afraid.” I still believe that We Shall overcome!

This faith can give us courage to face the uncertainties of the future. It will give our tired feet new strength as we continue our forward stride toward the city of freedom. When our days become dreary with low-hovering clouds and our nights become darker than a thousand midnights, we will know that we are living in the creative turmoil of a genuine civilization struggling to be born.

Today I come to Oslo as a trustee, inspired and with renewed dedication to humanity. I accept this prize on behalf of all men who love peace and brotherhood. I say I come as a trustee, for in the depths of my heart I am aware that this prize is much more than an honor to me personally.

Every time I take a flight, I am always mindful of the many people who make a successful journey possible – the known pilots and the unknown ground crew.

So you honor the dedicated pilots of our struggle who have sat at the controls as the freedom movement soared into orbit. You honor, once again, Chief Lutuli of South Africa, whose struggles with and for his people, are still met with the most brutal expression of man’s inhumanity to man. You honor the ground crew without whose labor and sacrifices the jet flights to freedom could never have left the earth. Most of these people will never make the headline and their names will not appear in Who’s Who. Yet when years have rolled past and when the blazing light of truth is focused on this marvellous age in which we live – men and women will know and children will be taught that we have a finer land, a better people, a more noble civilization – because these humble children of God were willing to suffer for righteousness’ sake.

I think Alfred Nobel would know what I mean when I say that I accept this award in the spirit of a curator of some precious heirloom which he holds in trust for its true owners – all those to whom beauty is truth and truth beauty – and in whose eyes the beauty of genuine brotherhood and peace is more precious than diamonds or silver or gold.

For myself, I can only say that I wish with all my heart we had not lost him so soon, that I think ours would be a better world and a better society if we had been given more time with this man, with his wisdom and his integrity, and most of all his fierce courage.

And above all, I wish I could say we live now in the world he envisioned.

But I can promise to keep working towards it.

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The Wheel Turns; Darkness Into Light

Posted on by KMClantoren

Welcome to the new year!

I hope everyone had something fun or exciting or heartwarming over the holiday season — which is also the time when the Northern Hemisphere meets and endures its longest night of the year and begins to slowly spin back towards warmth and light.  For me, I had a few highlights throughout the holidays, but the best part by far was my NYE party.

We had a fluctuating number as some had to leave early and others came late, but I think all told we had 14-16 people in the house eating dessert, exchanging gifts, and playing games to bid GOODBYE WE WILL NOT MISS YOU to 2017 and SOME IMPROVEMENT WOULD BE GOOD HERE 2018.  Which we did with the use of fire.  And piñatas.

I bought a pair of piñatas, a 1 and a 7.  Throughout the party, people wrote things on slips of paper and notecards and whatever else they chose — things they wanted to banish, things they wanted to release, things they wished to leave behind — and stuffed them in the piñatas.  People wrote lists, or the same grievance over and over, and I think at least one person fed an angry word in letter by letter.  We even took “orders” from our cousin party being held by some friends a few states away.

And at midnight, we took the piñatas outside in the -15 degree weather or whatever it was, and burned them to ashes.

It’s very therapeutic.  To take the frustrations and fears of the year that was and to let them go, to watch them be unmade and cast into the midnight sky.  To set down the burdens of one year and feel them melt from the shoulders — only to make room to carry new weight in the days and weeks to come, probably.  But it’s nice.  It’s not spectacular, and it’s not super dramatic, but it feels good to watch those feelings and experiences and shadows burn.

Maybe next year, if it isn’t -15 degrees, we’ll do a bigger fire and toast marshmallows.  That seems fair, right?

Personally, I’m still lobbying for a green or purple fire, too, but that’s tougher.  Luckily we have a designated friend-as-fire-marshal, and he handles that complicated stuff.  I just provide the piñatas and the backyard.

The thing about our NYE party is that it has evolved over the years.  A decade ago, it would be just Sarah and I and a friend some years, watching movies all night.  Then we started to gather with greater numbers of people, to make it more of an event.  In the last few, it’s become an all-out party which doubles as the friends gift-giving celebration for those who attend.  For the last 2 years, I’ve added an element of Christmas stockings.

Which is to say, for every person who comes to the party (or who is connected to this friends-family in some way), I make them a stocking.  A few people have real ones we hang on the mantle — those are the people who look to me and my house as their alternate home.  But for everyone there is a bag of candy and an orange and some nuts (the latter 2 from German tradition) and something else.  This year, I gave people CDs.

Half the friends-family got funny CDs of, well, this.

The other half got a CD mix I made.

I know, I know, that’s so 2003.  Whatever.  It seems silly to buy flash drives to hand out 17 songs as a playlist, and I just don’t do streaming music yet.  If anybody has a better idea, I’ll gladly hear it out.  Until then, CDs.

The mix I made for them is one I really like, and it has a lot in it that carried me through last year and will continue to carry me into 2018.  I called it “Light in the World” because, at heart, it’s a mix of songs either about the light that is already in the world — love, kindness, courage, honor — or songs about hanging onto and nurturing the light within when such light is needed against a colder world.

In the end, we’re all only what we give to the people in our lives, to the world beyond our immediate circle, and to the future yet to come.  And I, as I have said before, intend to give light.  And love.  And hope.

So here is the mix I made:

The World As I See It by Jason Mraz
Bridge Over Troubled Water by Gregorian
I’ll Be The Light by Colton Dixon
So Alive by The Goo Goo Dolls
Fearless by Kat Perkins
Kinder by Copper Wimmin
Courage (Come Out To Play) by Justin Hines
Say Geronimo by Sheppard
Shatter Me (feat. Lzzy Hale) by Lindsey Stirling
I Am the Fire by Halestorm
The Light by Disturbed
Don’t Be So Hard On Yourself by Jess Glynne
Over and Over by The Goo Goo Dolls
Life is Wonderful by Jason Mraz
Weightless by Courtney Jones
Fly to Paradise by the Eric Whitacre Singers
O Fortuna by Gregorian

You might wonder at that last track.  “O Fortuna” is not a song about light, or courage, or standing up against the dark.  The Wikipedia translation of it is:

O Fortune,
like the moon you are changeable,
ever waxing or waning;
hateful life first oppresses
and then soothes as fancy takes it;
poverty and power
it melts them like ice.

Fate – monstrous and empty,
you whirling wheel,
you are malevolent,
well-being is vain and always fades to nothing,
shadowed and veiled you plague me too;
now through the game
I bring my bare back to your villainy.

Fate is against me
in health and virtue,
driven on and weighted down, always enslaved.
So at this hour, without delay,
pluck the vibrating strings;
since Fate strikes down the strong one,
everyone weep with me!

Not light, right?  It’s a lament, a cry for others to see the cruelty that Fate has dealt and sympathize.  A testament of injustice and unfairness.

Uplifting?  Well, the song itself it, but not in the context of its meaning.

But for me, that’s WHY this song is important in this mix.  Because you can have all the courage you want, can be armed with kindness and honor, can breathe light and sing hope through your veins, but eventually random chance and events beyond your control *will* take their toll.  You can skip through life on the road of ideals, head full of dreams and optimism, but someday the rocks of reality are going to come down on your head.

What matters is what you do next.

If — and when — Fate strikes down the strong person, what does the strong person do?

What choice do you make?

Do you weep and cry that Fate is unfair?  Do you curl up and surrender?  Do you blame the unkindness of Fate and petulantly refuse to accept the truth?

Because dark and light cannot exist without one another.  Hope doesn’t have power unless it has been born by overcoming despair.  Courage cannot be strong unless it is forged in fear.  Kindness has no meaning if it is insincere.

“O Fortuna” is the last track on the CD because it leaves the unanswered question for the listener:

In the face of callousness, of despair, of cruelty, will you stand up and be counted amongst the kind, the loving, and the brave?

What will you choose for 2018?

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