Have Yourself a Sloppy Little Christmas

I'd gotten a bit behind on my Hallmark Christmas movie viewing this year until we spent a weekend at a mountain resort with its own Christmas Village. Then, tuning into a Christmas movie before bed seemed just right. 

Over the weekend, we saw most or part of several of this year's new offerings, and I noticed a trend. Almost every story we watched featured a middle-aged woman who wanted Christmas to be perfect. Whether she was the main character, the main character's mom, or the boyfriend's mom, by the end of the movie, she always learned that imperfection makes each Christmas special. As long as the family has each other, whether in person or in spirit, the holiday is a success.

An ad for Hallmark that ran several times during every movie reinforced this common theme. The message of the commercial was that Hallmark may inspire us at the holidays, but the rest is up to us, so relax and enjoy your holiday.

I have to wonder-- has there been a backlash? Has Hallmark been getting some shade about presenting Christmas scenarios that are too perfect and somehow deflating their core viewership? Such a scenario seems kind of likely, and count on that network to know it, too. 

Even so? It's a lesson worth remembering.

Dry Spell

I saw Dirty Dancing when it came out in 1987. It was at the end of the summer after my dad died. My brother had moved to D.C., my girlfriend had moved to Milwaukee, my sister was in college, and I was working as a cook at a local cafe and catering company. My day off was the middle of the week, and rather than spend my time alone in the blinding sun on the crowded beach, I sought refuge in a dark theater at the mall. 

It must have been what was playing at the time I got there, and I remember being pleasantly charmed by the movie. So much so that I saw it again with a group of friends a week or so later. Of course, the film has gained and maintained iconic status in the nearly 40 years since, but I don't think I ever saw it again.

Until today. 

Since we are staying at one of the main filming locations, watching Dirty Dancing seemed like a perfect afternoon activity, especially after walking the property and hiking around the lake basin. And seeing it was nuts! That movie was unquestionably filmed right here, within sight of where we were sitting. Baby's cabin, the stone lodge, the gazebo by the lake, are all exactly the same. But the lake?

Well... Marvelous and Mysterious Mountain Lake has had some ups and downs (literally) since 1986 when the movie was shot. The lake is a legend for its fluctuating levels, and during the production, the water covered 55 acres, and the hotel property was waterfront. In the decades since, though, despite engineering and attempted restoration, the lake has receded to only a few acres at the far end of the basin, nearly out of view of the resort. 

Throughout the movie, that was almost all I could focus on. Anytime they showed the water, I gasped. I didn't realize what was missing until I saw it.

It just so happened that as we were watching the movie, a dear friend texted us that her elder dog was having a health crisis. We paused the film a few times to read the updates and send messages as supportive as we could.

Research has assured me that this dry spell for the lake is not evidence that anything is wrong with, but rather that it is working just as it always has. Mountain Lake's geology and topology are unique not just to this area but to the world. The last time it was at full capacity was 2005, and although nothing is for sure, that could, and probably will, change in the future.

I confess that I am finding it a little difficult to appreciate how cool these fluctuations are, especially when I see the lake at its lowest. Could it be allegorical? If so, I wonder what the lesson is and whether I can pass the test at the end.

The Last Leg

"Bill would HATE this," I commented as we drove up the winding mountain road; the higher we got, the steeper the drop-off. 

But the views! I would have loved them if I wasn't behind the wheel piloting us on the final 7 miles of our road trip to Mountain Lake Lodge. At 5:30, the December sun was long gone behind the mountains to the west, but the sky was magnificent. 

"Is that snow?" Heidi asked.

"Yup. Are those deer?" I asked in return.

And then, there it was: So many holiday lights! The lodge, the trees, the Christmas Village all lit up on the top of the mountain. Was it, dare I say? Dazzling?

Indeed it was.

Good for Something

In my many years of teaching English, I gave my fair share of standardized tests, both real and practice. Inevitably, there were student complaints, most along the lines of, "Why are the readings soooooo boring?" In real testing situations, I was prohibited by law from looking at these onerous passages, but the same was not true for the practice exams. Even so, I rarely read those tests carefully; usually, I was too busy grading and planning some activities that would actually teach the students to read and write rather than artificially gauge their abilities. But one day, the sighs and whimpers were too much. 

"What. is. wrong?" I asked.

"This test is soooooo boring!" a student whined, and many others agreed.

"What are you talking about?" I said and walked over to look at the passage. "Mysterious and Marvelous Mountain Lake" was the title. I quickly scanned the seven paragraphs and was not bored at all. Instead, I read a super interesting little article about one of the two natural lakes found in Virginia. For many years, its pattern of draining and filling baffled science until they discovered a huge drain hole in the bottom of the lake. It has also been a tourist destination for centuries: the first hotel was built in 1850.

"You guys!" I proclaimed. "This is NOT boring! Who knew there was such a marvelous and mysterious lake right here in Virginia!"

The class rolled their eyes at me.

"I mean it!" I doubled down. "It has a hole in it! It is beautiful! There is a historic hotel there! I am totally going on vacation to Mountain Lake one day!"

And that day? Is tomorrow! 

Last year, Heidi gave me a gift certificate to Mountain Lake Lodge for my birthday, and a few months ago, I booked a cabin there, just in time for their Christmas festivities. In addition to that lake, the Christmas Village and Marketplace, the miles of hiking trails, and other resort activities, the property was the filming location for Dirty Dancing. It's going to be uh-mazing!

I guess the SOL is good for something, after all.

Oh Hey, Heather

Reserve yours today! read the email. There is a Christmas Tree shortage this year. 

Heidi and I had been working to find the right time for this fun holiday chore, and this message galvanized me. Never mind the cold front sweeping through our region— wind chill be damned! We had to get our tree today! 

So I picked her up from school at 3, and we headed out to a local nursery—the very one who had sent me the email. The lot was deserted when we arrived, and there seemed to be no shortage of trees, so we sat a moment in the warm car, scoping out the situation as clouds of random topsoil and mulch swirled by. At last, I switched off the ignition, put on my mittens, and walked into the icy wind toward the nearest row of Fraser Firs.

A couple of days ago, I heard a story on the radio about the challenges that Christmas Tree farmers in North Carolina, the leading producer of Fraser Firs, were facing: climate change, extreme storms, and a spreading root rot called Phytophthora (Latin for plant destroyer). As bleak as that all sounded, I also learned that there is a whole field dedicated to preserving resilient Christmas Tree DNA, and that made me happy.

Today, I pulled out the second tree in the first row of Frasers, and dang! It was perfect. This particular nursery happens to name all of their trees, as regular readers may recall, and this one was Heather. We walked around a bit to make sure, but we needn't have, in less than 10 minutes, Heather was tied to the top of our car, and we were on the way home.

Riding the Cycle

By the time I retired last June, I'd been threatening to start a pickleball club at school for a couple of years. Unfortunately, the stars did not align: I was too busy, the activities coordinator was too busy, and the rec center attached to our school was unwilling to share space.

Since then, a couple of things have changed. Besides the fact that I'm no longer very busy at all (Hallelujah!), the activities coordinator offered the court on the school side of the fieldhouse if I was willing to do it on Wednesday when the teaching staff has meetings. I agreed, so he sent out a couple of messages on the LMS and added some info on the morning announcement, and today was the inaugural day. 

Of course, I came prepared. Knowing my clientele and the time of day we would meet, I researched age-appropriate strategies, drills, and games. I brought my bucket of balls, some cones, the extra paddles a parent donated last year, and some Jolly Ranchers. I also borrowed a Taco, Cat, Goat, Cheese, Pizza deck from Heidi. (It's a good icebreaker, and the cards are like tickets for the winners of the mini-games and challenges.)

At 2:45, a group of ten seventh-grade boys voluntarily assembled. I knew eight of them. The court was in the middle of the unstructured after-school sports choice activity, which was a distraction as I led them through my own very structured activity. It wasn't flawless, but it worked, and at the end of the hour, the kids had a better knowledge of the game.

And now? I have lots of ideas for improvement. Of course.

Birthday Adventure

My aunt set her purse on the restaurant floor and scooted her chair over. We were on the final stop of our adventure, an outing we had planned to celebrate her 88th birthday. 

Over the last three hours she had given me a tour of historic Greenbelt, MD, the community she and my mom had grown up in. We had seen their houses and retraced their routes to school, the lake, the shopping center, and the pool. She had pointed out the tree under which the two of them waited every afternoon for my grandmother to return from her job at the Pentagon. "We saluted every car with a person in uniform in it," she laughed. "It was wartime, you know."

After Greenbelt, we drove the short distance to American Legion Post 136, a place I had spent quite a bit of time when I was a child. "Do you think we'll find any kittens in the window wells?" I joked as we approached the converted farmhouse. Trying the glass door, I was pleased to find it unlocked, and we showed ourselves in. There was a glass display case with some memorabilia, and I could see the restaurant and bar through a door beyond. We paused in a room with plaques on the wall engraved with the names of all the past commanders and presidents of the ladies' auxiliary. There we found the names of both of my grandparents. "Can I help you?" asked a woman of about 50 with some alarm. 

It turned out that the place was closed; we had only gotten in because the door was unlocked for the contractor who was onsite to give an estimate for roof repair. She politely showed us out, even as we explained who we were and why we were there. She shrugged with a mixture of apology and indifference at the mention of my grandfather and the baseball league named for him, and then she bolted the door behind us.

The next stop was the house where my grandparents lived when I was a child. It was smaller than in my recollection, but I could picture every room. There was the bay window in the dining room, the small kitchen window, my grandparents' bedroom, the attic. I reminded my aunt of how hot and stuffy the place would get on Sundays in winter, my grandfather would be cooking a prime rib and smoking a cigar and all the other adults were smoking, too. The gas fireplace was cranking heat and all the kids would lie with our faces on the cool plastic of the carpet runner, gasping for cool air on the floor.

And now we were at a restaurant known for its southern-style cooking. A young waitress came over to get our drink orders, but paused before she did to push a chair over to the other side of my aunt. "This is for your purse," she said.

I remembered a friend from work who told us that in some African American circles it's considered bad luck to put your purse on the floor. "Thank you!" I told our server, "Otherwise she'll never have any money!" 

She laughed and walked away. "Who cares?" my aunt said. "I feel rich, because today was such an amazing day!"