Last night the Ladies were off babysitting a good friend's kids, and I had the evening to myself. After half-heartedly half-watching a Bond film, I decided that I'd make use of our unnaturally clear weather and take a walk. Old friends were up over the Eastern horizon: Orion, the twin galactic clusters of Taurus, the white-and-cream twins of Castor and Pollux, and on the southeastern horizon, throwing fire like Liz Taylor's solitaire in highbeams, Alpha Canis Majoris. Sirius. The brightest star, slowly winking between sapphire and ruby and pure white. Dropping my gaze, I saw that the Christmas lights were out in force in Sunnyvale. I've never yet seen so many lights put up in so many creative ways. Rainbow lights strung deep into a yew, so that as you walk by they're winking in and out, like a tiny flock of firefinches. A five-trunked tree tightly wound in white garlands, looking like a mascaline Saguaro. On a dark sidestreet, a single slashing loop of color, like a Japanese sketch. That's one of my favorite things about this season: take a rainless evening and meander among the festively-illuminated family residences. Next year I'll be pushing a stroller among the Christmas lights, some of which evoke the same sort of wonder that I get from nature films of luminescent deep-sea organisms. Living filigrees of pouring rainbows.
To all - a merry Christmas. |
