MONDAY, DECEMBER 6, 2010

FIVE CORNERS UPDATE
Industrious day at the Essex Junction Five Corners light. The wait was so excrutiatingly long I was able to walk to Big Lots, pick out a pack of embarrassingly inexpensive Christmas cards, return to the car and sign, seal and stamp each one, with time left over.
I walked them over to the village post office, mailed them and scampered back to the intersection. The light still hadn't changed.
So, I had a few tugs of eggnog and...

When I came to, the cell phone was ringing. It was a friend from Montana who had received the card and was calling to extend the best of the season. We were in the midst of a vigorous back and forth on the true meaning of Christmas when the light finally changed. I wished my pal "all the best", and drove to the dollar store, where I was able to start, and finish, my Christmas shopping. Thanks to the Essex Junction Five Corners light, I truly had found the'spirit of Christmas'.


Dust of Snow
by Robert Frost (1923)

The way a crow
Shook down on me
The dust of snow
From a hemlock tree
Has given my heart
A change of mood
And saved some part
Of a day I had rued.