100 Days of Wonder – #77
There is a Disney Dwarf for every mood. Here’s a picture of my Christmas jumper (I also have a Christmas T-shirt and shirt – both Mickey Mouse) which captures today’s mood well. I am grumpy because I am watching FC St Pauli lose to Werder Bremen in the Bundesliga, because today hasn’t gone to plan, because I haven’t done my long run and because I have a cold. I also have ridiculous period pains and am generally a bit rage-y. Neither of us are feeling well enough to run. In fact we just walked down to the post office to post Christmas cards and then to the vet to pick up some tablets for Einstein-cat and were both wiped out when we got back.
So I am trying to just accept the fact that I have a cold and that my body is an interesting hormonal mess these days and just focus on what I can do. So I have sorted some more Christmas stuff, wrapped a couple of presents and finished the decorations in the dining room. I made some mince pies that have turned out quite well and when I was sat on the floor earlier wondering what the hell I was doing there (I think I just hadn’t got up yet from wrapping presents but who knows), I did some gentle stretching. So overall I am not actually unhappy being grumpy. Sometimes grumpy is good. And I do like my jumper. It makes me smile and I wore it to do the College visit the other day and it made lots of other people smile too. So maybe there is joy to be found in being grumpy sometimes.
100 Days of Wonder – #76
The stories we tell ourselves and each other are remarkably powerful. That power can be both positive and negative of course but they’re always our stories and they can always be retold. Our Christmas tree is full of stories. Here’s a picture of it. Tinkerbell at the top, Disney baubles galore….
The tree, or rather the decorations because it’s a real tree, tell the story of mine and Kath’s life together. Every decoration means something and one thing is added each year. So the tree tells the story of the first Christmas in our house nearly 19 years ago with 2 cattens that required sacrificial baubles strategically placed. It tells of our first Disney trip and all the ones that came after as we made our own tradition of buying a decoration from the Christmas Shop in the Magic Kingdom on each trip. There are stories of friendship and memories of friends who should still be here but died far too young. There are stories of childhood and our pasts and futures intertwining. Most of all there are stories of us finding ourselves. Our tree is a story of the complexity of who we are. It’s Disney, it’s kitch, it has some classy bits, some expensive bits, some old, some new, some bought, some given to us, it’s past and future and it’s always full of joy and wonder. It feels like our Christmas tree is a strong reminder that we have found our place in the world, that we no longer feel any need to conform to any expectations or norms, that we are comfortable with who we are and that we no longer care what others think. Maybe we’ve been like that for a long time, I’m not sure. But decorating the tree, talking about the baubles as we placed them, laughing, acknowledging the sadness of some memories and the joy of others, it felt like we are exactly who we we’re meant to be and that’s a great privilege indeed.
100 Days of Wonder – #75
I had a good day today. I got some work stuff done, making the to do list a very tiny bit shorter. I also got to speak to some great college students in Huddersfield and I didn’t even get lost driving there and back. I’ve worn my Grumpy Christmas jumper all day, finished a Lego Christmas scene and decorated our tree.
I was busy but there was lots of joy today. Busy but happy plus Christmas reminded me of this picture at Epcot. When I took it we’d been on the go a while and had just sat down for a little break. Busy but happy. And busy but happy is a kind of Disney theme – or actually just holiday theme for us. While we do have quite a lot of downtime compared to some who ‘do’ Disney, our trips are never lying by the pool kind of holidays. I like busy but happy and I hope that in your inevitable busy you can also find some happy.
My Conversations 