For the first time in many years I have had the thought of putting up a Christmas tree this early in the season. Because my business is affected by the gift-giving nature of this holiday, my true personal Christmas feeling begins on Christmas day and lasts until the end of January. But this morning I got the tree-thought early, and sadly looked around my living room at the piles and piles of books and magazines. They’re ones of must-reads, catch-ups, textbooks that didn’t end with the semester. I cannot move them out because then they will not be visually screaming their guilty message, “Read me!” And I will never get to them until eventually, and we all know that never comes.
But writers do harbor a sense of creativity in other areas as well, and my solution is most pleasing to me. Atop Didascalicon and Space and Place, Munro and McCarthy and more in a cohesive cone-like pile, an angel sits with gold-flecked gossamer wings and Christmas smile—upon her recycled Christmas tree.
The Lost Children: A Charity Anthology