Bernadette Benda

Hello 2021. Though I’m writing this in 2020 #timetravel

1.

It’s Christmas day, and my room is sparkling white. I guess all the white paint and white decorations have paid off, because now with the snow falling in swift fluffy flakes outside, every touch of green and every bit of concrete buried, my room feels like I’m in a snow globe, except opposite, with the snow outside and me in the glass. Protected from the chill and the winds, but not from the dreamy white snow.

2.

I used the snow-blower once. Not only did I survive, but the driveway did in fact get cleared. It was the annual February snowstorm. Dad was in New York, my sister in college. Probably nearly two feet of snow was buried all around us.

3.

[redacted]

4.

We had a shockingly white Christmas this year. Lot’s and lot’s of snow, which still hasn’t quite melted because the temperature fluctuate like a metronome on high speed. I’ve eaten far too many cookies, and if I turn into a rather flabby looking hobbit, that’s why.

There’s something magical about going to mass at midnight on Christmas Eve when it’s snowing hard. Makes you want to run down the street shouting “Merry Christmas Bedford Falls!”

And something peacefully weird about the days between Christmas and New Years, when the rush is all over and you just collapse like a soft potato and realize that you need to rethink you’re life.

But that’s what I like about the end of the year. It’s an annual life reset.

5.

Oh and, here’s an owl.