Häid Jõule, Merry Christmas, & Frohe Weihnachten

No matter how you say it, may your holidays be bright and contain the magical touch of Christ this season! I wish you all a cozy holiday full of peace, joy, and love!

Merry Christmas!
Feliz Navidad!
Veselé Vianoce!
Craciun Fericit!
Häid Jõule!
Frohe Weihnachten!

I really don't know life at all

Tonight, I went to a brilliant concert by an Estonian jazz vocalist, Liisi Koikson -- a tribute to Joni Mitchell. Listening to her renditions of songs about community and conflict and living, I was drawn to the lyrics and the emotion of the music. Raw, funny, philosophical... I realized that I also don't really know life at all, but I do know how to appreciate a nice evening in pensive musical atmosphere.

Both Sides, Now
by Joni Mitchell

I've got a flat

I suppose it is both literally and metaphorically true at the moment. I came home tonight to see my beautiful red bicycle devoid of air. Some tricksters must have targeted my pretty wheels that were parked downstairs while I was at work and liberated their tires of air. A sad sight, indeed, as the bike can nearly not stand up on its own kickstand at this point. In my mind, a pretty harmless prank but one that reflects a bit of my own energy level at the moment. Someone must have also sneaked in when I wasn't paying attention and stolen some of my air too.

I try not to dwell on the darkness, but in tiptoeing around the very obvious reality that there is an absence of light at this time of year in this part of the world only drives me yet further from any illumination or chance of sunny disposition. When the sun does shine for a few hours (2 days so far in December) and I am faced with all the brightness of the sky, I am reminded of the Allegory of the Cave we read in my 12th grade English class with Ms. Bierbaum. I feel a bit like one of the cave dwellers emerging from a world of mere shadows. The honesty of the sky and the sun seem shocking and overwhelming -- one has to squint to look into the blueness of the sky overhead. On these days when the light appears, my urges to run outside and plaster myself somewhere, anywhere in the light feels a bit absurd (I'm quite certain the locals would stare). I have probably been too spoiled by an abundance of this truth of natural beams of light around me in the past. Only now can I appreciate what is missing as I emerge from the shadows to see reality basked in sunlight. If I had to rewrite one of my essays from 12th grade English answering the question What is truth? I would most definitely write that light is truth. (Yes, Ms. Bierbaum, I have finally progressed a little on that particular quest!)

Faced with these truths in the forms of absence of air and light, I understand why I feel flat and a bit lifeless these days. The bears have got it right; the only solution is to hibernate.

Signs of winter

Lately, I've been focused on the dulldroms of late fall and early winter in Estonia. It's a bit gray around here, and it doesn't help that the sun rises at 8:49 and has already set by 3:21 (December 10). As I write this, the filmy cover of clouds slowly turns from ash to a seamless back in color. Someone from a year-round sun-drenched climate, I struggle with feeling sleepy and a bit grouchy. In Wyoming we endure blizzards, windstorms, tornadoes, and an occasional rain; we have violent weather, but we also have an abundant amount of sunshine, with the glowing red orb reappearing after each tempestuous interruption. After a mere one or two days without seeing the sun, Wyomingites begin to complain of the oppressiveness of the weather. Estonia is perhaps a good test of character for those of us from the sunny prairie.

A student of mine recently gave me a copy of Moominland Midwinter by Tove Jansson after she discovered with horror that I had never experienced the Finnish children's popular series about Moomins. Cute, fuzzy creatures captured by Jansson appear misshapen and a bit strange, but I was delighted to find the books such an accurate description of Nordic humor and perspective on this dark time of year. In this story, Moomintroll awakes from his winter slumber and cannot return to sleep. He ventures out amongst the creatures of winter and the strange landscape of the season. In a sudden outburst, he shouts this angry summer song:

Listen, winter creatures, who have sneaked the sun away,

Who are hiding in the dark and making all the valley grey:

I am utterly alone, and I’m tired to the bone,

And I’m sick enough of snowdrifts just to lay down and groan.

I want my blue verandah and the glitter of the sea,

And I tell you one and all that your winter’s not for me!

“Just you wait until my sun’s coming back to look at you, and then you’ll look silly, all of you,” Moomintroll shouted and didn’t even care about rhymes anymore:

Because then I’ll dance on a sunflower disk

And lie on my stomach in the warm sand

And keep my window open all the day

On the garden and bumblebees

And on the sky-blue sky

And my own great

Orange-yellow

SUN!

From Moominland Midwinter by Tove Jansson, 1957, pp. 39-40

I have no problem relating to little Moomintroll and could stand outside right now and shout nearly the same thing at the VERY gray sky! However, I restrain. I am not a Moomin. I am an adult. Focus on the positive. Think brightly (after all, the sun did shine here yesterday).

There are pretty holiday lights,



and fancy university balls



and sometimes snow



and good friends to visit with over mulled wine (feuerzangenbowle)



and don't forget Grandma Bea's Christmas cookies!

The Christmas season has begun here and that brings some brightness. I can throw myself into this time of year, even if the days are dark and a bit lackluster. After all is said in done, I will learn, just like Moomintroll, to appreciate some of the finer points of this wintry season (Jansson, 1957, p. 151):

“Do you know, when the snow comes, it falls down from the sky like tiny and very cold stars. And up there in the blue sky you can see fluttering blue and green curtains.”

…

“Yes, and even if you can’t walk on the snow you can slide along on it,” continued Moomintroll. “It’s called skiing. It makes you rush ahead fast, like lightening, in a cloud of whirling snow, and you’ve got to look sharp or else!”