simplicity

This Thanksgiving, we didn't rise early to watch the Macy's parade, the kind of annual pageantry we've observed only once. We didn't tune into whatever football game had sports fans all aflutter, a spectacle we've successfully shunned these last twenty-six years. We didn't even prepare our traditional holiday feast. No. This Thanksgiving we did something altogether new: we slept in, enjoyed a leisurely breakfast, and spent as little time as possible in the kitchen.

There were crossword puzzles and a classic holiday film. There were lights, tangled and bright, woven through sections of our living room tree that had sadly--and seemingly irreparably--gone dark. And, before all that, in the late morning hours, there was one dog's singularly spirited reply to the query, "Do you want to go to the lake?" Unable to stop laughing through our girl's ongoing zipping, bounding displays of unbridled exhilaration, Dennie and I gathered the festive debris left in the wake of Hurricane Maisie and restored the entirely unbroken decorations to their rightful places. We dressed our bouncy, smiley, waggly baby in her holiday finery, and the three of us set course--over the river and through the woods--to the unseasonably sunny and absolutely vacant lakeshore.

Our hike was brisk, in every sense of the word. Maybe it was the cold. Maybe it was the thrill of going out again after three homebound weeks, but Maisie was in an unmistakable rush, sniffing, tracking, urging us on to see more, to walk faster. A few steps onto the bridge provided sufficient evidence that the wooden planks had iced over. Our options were these: turn back and restrict our morning outing to the main area of the park or trust that one hurried hurricane hound wouldn't propel us forward with such power that we'd collectively slip and slide straight into the lake. Obviously, we chose the former; otherwise we'd still be thawing out somewhere as Ice Ice Baby looped unbidden and unmercifully through our subzero cerebra. Bitter winds gusted over the water, chilling our cheeks, stinging our ears. The walk was lovely, refreshing--if more energetic than we'd anticipated--but, ultimately the wintry weather won out. After only an hour, we bundled ourselves back into the car, heater on, and returned home for a no-fuss lunch of reheated leftovers. In contrast to the tempo of our lakeside trek, the holiday itself passed unrushed, uncomplicated. It was peaceful. As work pressures mount, as world events continue to foster an unsettling sense of uncertainty, our Thursday was the picture of simplicity. For that and so much more, we are, as ever, thankful.