Eight thousand seven hundred and sixty hours

An exceedingly ordinary holiday letter

The holiday message below was written in January 2001. Its tidings are timeless. Let the light shine!

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Eight thousand seven hundred and sixty hours. Three hundred and sixty-five days. Fifty-two weeks. Twelve months. One blur. Sometimes I marvel at the concept of capturing a year’s worth of happenings in an annual document. The big events, the ones that usually make the cut, are the crests of the hills. Achievements, no doubt, but they tell nothing of the chaotic charm of the daily ride.

‘Twas some night before Christmas. The children were nestled all snug in their beds, leaving Jim and me with time to ourselves. What more romantic way to spend the evening than wallowing in the dark, in an open field, working to dislodge the mobile hen house from the mud. We took out the neighbor’s grapevine trellis in the process.

Finally finding sleep around midnight, it seemed like mere moments until 3:37 am when what to my wondering ears did appear but the sound of miniature feet making their way up the stairs. Those tiny tootsies sound more like the changing of the palace guard at that hour. The night before, they’d turned up at 1:45, and the one before that it was 4:14. Queen mother was much displeased.

The next day, in my early morning delirium, I agreed to make pancakes. While searching for ingredients, I found that the zip-bag of Friendship Bread starter (a tale unto itself, and not remotely friend-like) had ruptured during the night, leaking sweet, glutinous ooze down the front of the dryer, onto the floor, and under a pile of previously clean clothes. The sudden need for the washing machine led to the discovery of wet clothes inside, a calamity that repeated itself with the dryer. I’d planned to handle the laundering the night before, but my functioning brain cells had fallen beneath a mud-bound chicken house.

Just then, someone with miniature feet chased the cats out into the rain and slammed the door, signaling the other wee human to let the cockatiel out of her cage. The bird, startled by the ringing phone, flew to the top of the window and shrieked. One kid asked eight times in two minutes if she could decorate the tree, while the other made anguished, brink-of-starvation sounds. I stood there with embryonic bread goo on my slippers and willed myself to laugh.

This is how it happens. This is the life that rules the hours.

Thinking back over the year, more moments come to mind: The one when Rachel took the spotlight at her school performance by pulling her frilly frock all the way over her head. The one when Michaela lost her first tooth.

The day another 70 chicks arrived in the mail.

The day we lost Grandma Greenwood.

There was Kate’s spectacular wedding. Our daughters looked like faeries in their white, organza dresses.

There were hours upon hours of growing food and selling it, of milling lumber and building furniture from it, of believing in what we do.

One child no longer needed a special note to remind her of home when she went off to preschool. The other one missed the bus on the first day of first grade, and the next day—the very next day—she rode that bus away.

We started a ritual, one of only a few to consistently survive the daily pandemonium. After dinner and just before bedtime, when we are together for the first time all day, we play “Low-High.” Someone begins by directing a question to the person of their choosing.

“What was your low for the day?” And then, “What was your high?”

Once in a while, the low or the high will be remembered for more than a day. Far more often, it is an event or a feeling that is displaced by dawn. But, it matters in the moment. It gives us a reason to consider life from a different perspective, to put ourselves in another’s shoes, to be reminded that each evening brings a fresh opportunity to let go and another chance to look for joy.

Everyday, there are pancakes to make. Everyday, there are busses to catch. Everyday, there is a star in the east to follow. Every single day.

~Elizabeth

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