Dear Santa, I hope you've been watching because
I've been extra nice this year.
I would like only three gifts, please.
A new sketch book,
a Sugar Plum Fairy Chandelier,
and when I grow up,
I want to be Creative!
Thanks a'much!
Hee! Hee! Hee! I mean, Ho! Ho! Ho!
Happy Holidays everyone! In a sweet colorful world, what do candy canes, whirly pops, peppermints, gum drops, a bit of wire,
a few yards of ribbon and lace have in common? Well, not really too much, unless you make it so! When I was a kid, I used to
concoct the most wild, hare-brained stories about well, just about everything...where up is down and down is up! A place where the local farmers crops are lollipops, grown in perfect, tidy little rows and smooth, shiny licorice vines grow up into the clouds.
And curly, curved sugar ribbon roads lined with candy cane fences stretch on for dozens of miles! And every Spring, the meadows are laden with thousands of multicolored jelly bean buds, which would go on to vibrantly bloom into the biggest,
pouffiest, fluffiest, yummiest cotton candy Dandelion's you have ever seen! And all of which I then went on to share with my ever patient Grandfather as he sat down to the table to eat his dinner. I know at first Grandpapa thought it odd as I proceeded to
gleefully yak, yak, yak his ear off, telling him the most absurd tales, that I ever so easily mixed in with the real events of my day. Especially because my dear Grandpapa was really a quite solemn man, a stern man, if you will, even a little on the gruff side.
But...someone forgot to tell me, as a matter of fact, I hardly ever saw that side of him and when I did, it was always through someone else's eyes...like one of the other grandchildren, who ran screaming from the room when ever he entered it! But as I
remember she was just scared of people with white hair, and boy, did she ever go completely ballistic when it came time to sit on Santa's knee and tell him how good we'd been all year! No, I never saw that side of Grandpapa. I saw the man with the so
serious face, listening diligently, thumbs quietly twirling, trying desperately to hold back a smile, but his eyes couldn't hide it. Oh, no they couldn't, his big brown eyes simply twinkled! The man I knew planted purple iris bulbs and gently tended them till
they bloomed into ravishing ruffled ladies, he put nectar out for the Humming birds and didn't even bother sticking around for the pay off of watching them devour it. Yes, that's the man I knew. I knew the man that fed every stray cat that came around!
Those kitties loved him, they knew, animals always do. And I loved him, and he knew. Certainly season's bring particular memories to the forefront for me, trigger neatly packed away moments, treasured, crystalized bits of time held tightly together
like a snowflake. They are bound to my mind forever and always make me feel happy to remember them. I liken it all to the first time I recall seeing snow...it seems like such a simple thing but I was shaken to the core, I thought I would never recover!
I remember thinking, now this is true magic! I mean up to that point in my young life I had only experienced rain! As if that wasn't wondrous enough! This is it, what could possibly be better?! Watching it fall, as though in slow motion, each feathery flake,
silently floating to the ground, building and piling up, up, up till it nearly reached the window sill. I would sit for hours, staring out, completely engrossed, as the sun sat and the wind grew colder and the street lights came on, the white flakes
turned from downey to crystalline, sharp edged, refracting light glints in every color of the rainbow.
It was absolutely miraculous, so magnificent it made me cry, silly I know, but true.
Ok, now, lets get on to the subject at hand and what might that be, you ask? Well, have you ever felt inexplicably drawn to do
something? I have had the burning desire to create, an absolute, unbounded, self indulgent urge to create! Oh, what, oh what, shall I
make? Let's see, something excessive, governed by no adult conventions, something deliriously mad, dangerously theatrical,
but with the slightest air of tradition. Now, being that I have made a vow to never, ever take seriousness seriously! I wanted to
allow my so serious 19th century Meissen porcelains the opportunity to cast aside their built in pomp and circumstance and
titter in the face of convention!
So here it is, a Sugar Plum Fairy Chandelier...
I think Hansel and Gretel would have approved!
When we were young,
we thought like children,
the holiday's were always a twinkling delight.
The sweet scent of pine and peppermint and baked cinnamon apples
permeated the entire house,
and if I close my eyes,
I can see it all through the eyes of a child again,
all I have to do is knock on the tiny red wreathed door,
the one labeled Christmas 1972,
and whoop, there it is!
First, I hear the sounds,
faint giggles and laughter,
mixed in with pling! Pluck! Pling!
Music of sounds and sounds of music,
shimmering tones so high it must be
what ice sounds like forming and
cicles sound like growing long towards the ground!
And over in the corner
a glittering, tall silver tree,
made completely out of crimped aluminum!
Beside it on the floor,
hidden amongst the many carefully wrapped boxes,
a multicolored, rotating light,
ever so cautiously, I sneak up, making sure no one is watching,
so's to steal a candy cane off the tree!
As I try to act casual, tip toeing out, I hear Grandpapa sweetly say, "While visions of Sugar Plums danced in their heads!"
Season's Greetings and Happy Holiday's! I'll see you all in the New Year!
Visuals details: Assorted candy, wire and ribbon, 19th century Meissen porcelain figures, Swarovski crystals, and one 12" tall hand painted porcelain Sugar Plum Fairy ballerina dressed in antique remnants and wearing a blonde mohair wig crowned with half of a circa 1910 enameled metal belt buckle, just to top it off a few tiny swallow's feathers from last years visitors. And in case you were wondering, Yep, we're going to eat it all up when the holiday's are over!
