[First Night, Boston; 12/31/10]
I'm still trying to regain some purchase on normal life after the whirlwind of the holidays with all the attendant disruptions of travel and manifold obligations to be sociable. It's been like trying to land a sea-plane on choppy waters. The churning is only slowly beginning to wind down and my sea-sickness to settle. There's been cleanup to do, getting things back in order. The bills have been paid and laundry done, but the Christmas tree is still up and needs undressing, ornaments packed away, so it can be picked up with Thursday morning's trash. Such a pretty tree (sigh). And work has piled up at the office, too.
[First Night processioneers]
I've been enjoying Lorianne's and Beth's participation in A River of Stones blog-writing challenge to write one short observational piece per day. Perhaps I'll be inspired once my mind has a chance to settle down out of doing mode and into some space that allows for observation. But you don't push the river, as Van Morrison sang. So I'll wait to feel the current.
[Copley Plaza, First Night, Boston]
Actually, we had a lot of fun on New Year's Eve. We went to the 5:30pm First Night procession down Boylston Street and watched the 7:00 fireworks from the Boston Common. It was a warm night instead of the usual icy cold. Boston had the first First Night celebration 35 years ago and it's still going strong. The early procession and fireworks (they have things going on all day, too) make it family-friendly and keep the drunken riff-raff at bay, at least in the early evening hours. After the fireworks, we walked back to D's place and cooked up some pasta with store-bought sauce and stayed in and relaxed. I barely stayed awake until midnight.
Then on Sunday we drove up to the New Hampshire seacoast where my friend Toni and her husband recently bought a condo, not far from where my parents used to live. Beautiful location - I love it up there. They had a nice small gathering of friends and I had a great time. On our way up there, we stopped at the beach just as the sun was setting and found horses and few people out strolling, enjoying the still unusually warm weather.
[Hampton Beach, New Hampshire; 1/1/11]
You can see more photos of First Night in Boston in my Flickr set and a few more photos from the seacoast here. See you when things quiet down!
It sounds like you had a lovely New Year's weekend, and that your New Year is off to a grand start. Thanks for the hat-tip on the stones project. It actually feels like a break to post "just" a short bit every day: winter minimalism at its best.
That's probably my favorite song on my favorite Van Morrison CD, btw.
Posted by: Lorianne | Wednesday, January 05, 2011 at 01:32 PM