Author: boolie

White Christmas

An ice-covered Siskiyou Street on Christmas morning in the Irvington neighborhood of Portland, Oregon

Here in Portland we got our first white Christmas since 1937. I was alone on Christmas morning when I went out for a walk as the pup didn’t want to leave the house, not because of the light dusting of snow but rather the thin sheet of ice that covered the sidewalks and streets. We sometimes get ice from either freezing rain or frozen snow melt, or in this case a little of both, but it melted in a couple of days when warmer weather returned. Made a mess of things over the holidays though.

Just in Time Assembly

Our tortoiseshell cat Trixie sitting under the Christmas tree

We never do too much decorating for Christmas but this year the only decoration is the Christmas tree, with lights but no ornaments, and even that only went up a couple days before Christmas. Normally I assemble the tree, shoo the cats out of it, and put on the ornaments, reflecting on the memories they represent, but between dealing with Sam’s illness and the job search I ran out of both time and energy. Trixie has appreciated the tree the most, although she does not spend nearly the time under it that Emma did (who could?). She hasn’t tried to eat or climb the tree, a sign of her maturity I suppose at three years old, but that branch dipping down to the ground on the right was permanently bent by Emma during her many solo ascents of the tree. I used to hide deformities like those towards the back where they couldn’t be seen but now I embrace them as a reminder of sweet Em and her tree.