O blessed free time.

One of the things I did this weekend was to get all of my Christmas cards out. I still do ink-and-paper Christmas cards even though lots of people have gone to electronic cards or things like that.

I send a few to family, a few to far-off friends, a number to friends from church. It's funny, as I address them, I think of two things:

a quotation from Truman Capote's "A Christmas Memory":

Who are they for?

Friends. Not necessarily neighbor friends: indeed, the larger share is intended for persons we've met maybe once, perhaps not at all. People who've struck our fancy. Like President Roosevelt. Like the Reverend and Mrs. J. C. Lucey, Baptist missionaries to Borneo who lectured here last winter. Or the little knife grinder who comes through town twice a year. Or Abner Packer, the driver of the six o'clock bus from Mobile, who exchanges waves with us every day as he passes in a dust-cloud whoosh. Or the young Wistons, a California couple whose car one afternoon broke down outside the house and who spent a pleasant hour chatting with us on the porch (young Mr. Wiston snapped our picture, the only one we've ever had taken).

Now, granted, young Mr. Capote is talking of fruitcakes. And I've never sent a card to the President (I presume he gets enough, and from people far more important than I am). But I do send out cards to people I don't see year in and year out, to people who perhaps touched my life once or twice but with whom I stay in some level of contact. But I think of that quotation as I write all of the addresses out, and as I stack the cards in order of zip code number (something Mr. Capote would not have known in his fruitcake days, as it didn't exist yet) in preparation for them being sent out.

The cards sat on my piano, next to the nativity scene, the rest of the weekend, in a neat little stack. (They are out in the mailbox now, awaiting the postal carrier.)

Christmas cards are one of the traditional things that I do. I don't know how widespread a tradition it remains; it seems a lot of people of my generation don't do it any more. But I still do, remembering the big production it was when I was a kid - I swan, my mother had 100 people on her list. (Some years, after I learned to type tolerably well, she hired me to do the addresses on the envelopes for them. And from that - as I've said before - I learned the polite conventions of how you address things; "Mr. and Mrs. Lastname" for a couple without children at home, "Mrs. Herfirstname Hislastname" for widows, and so on). And for me, it's link with those childhood Christmases, and yet also a way I tell myself, "You are a for-real for-true grownup: look, you are sending Christmas cards!" And I enjoy doing it. And I think at least some of the recipients enjoy it; I know people (relatives and friends from church) who were housebound during this time (either because of a short-term illness, or because of a permanent problem, or because they have given up driving and don't get out much) mentioned how they enjoyed getting mail that was REAL mail, not bills or advertisements. So I like sending cards (and I do send cards to people I know who are housebound for whatever reason) because I like to think that at least some people are made glad by them.

I also think of Sir John Betjeman's poem about Christmas, where he was (it is said) trying to fight himself out of the doubt and depression he felt. It contains the line, "And girls in slacks remember Dad/and oafish louts remember Mum" and perhaps it is not a very flattering line (I think at the time it was written, to be a girl in slacks was to essentially be seen as "fast" or perhaps "too mannish by half"). But in this modern day, I see it more as people who may not have much contact with tradition - who may be living adult lives very different from what was envisioned for them (and perhaps, very different from what they envisioned) thinking back to their family.

(I know in many ways my adult life is different from what I envisioned it would be as a child. Not that that's bad, it's just...sometimes I wonder what it would be like if I had, as I expected I would as a child, gotten married and had kids and stayed home with them like my mom did.)

(The entire poem is here, 'ware the pop-ups.)

But I do like sending off cards. I used up my entire box of 25 Leanin' Tree cards I bought, plus a few House-Mouse ones I had hanging around, so if in the next day or two I get an unexpected card or think of someone else I want to send a card to, I may have to go out and buy a few more.

****

I also finished the Lepidoptera mitts this weekend. I really love them, this is a wonderful pattern, and it is just the right weight to keep your hands warm typing in a chilly room, or to wear while reading in bed at night (I turn the thermostat down at night so if I read in bed, sometimes my hands get cold).

Many thanks to Alison at Simply Sock Yarn for the free pattern (it is on her blog, permalinked here.) And I can highly vouch for Simply Sock Yarn's customer service; I have bought a LOT from them over the past couple years and always been happy.

The yarn I used is not one of hers; it is from a small indie dyer named Damselfly Yarns (esty shop). The color is called Northern Lights; it is supposed to look like the aurora borealis in the night sky.



I can see why these kind of little fingerless gloves enjoyed popularity in the Victorian era. For one thing, they are practical and warm: you can write or knit or even play the piano while wearing them. But also, if you have pretty and expressive hands, they draw attention to them. (And I suppose hands were one of the few female body parts to which it was really appropriate to draw attention in that era...)

I'm going to do another pair in this pattern, using a variegated Wildfoote in rose and pink.