😶🌫️️ It’s cloudy today and I’m pleased for that. It compliments how I feel. Not that I regard cloudy days as gloomy. I usually welcome overcast days here on Maui - we already get plenty of sun. A cloudy day gives me permission to go inside, both physically and metaphorically. Today I am just feeling a wish to be inside of myself and alone. I am struggling to feel motivated to do things, when there are plenty of things that need doing. So the overcast weather is giving me permission to move quietly, slowly and be with myself. ⚘
…a magician spoke of a power or ‘presence’ lingering in the corner of his house, I learned to notice the ray of sunlight that was then pouring through a chink in the roof, illuminating a column of drifting dust, and to realize that that column of light was indeed a power, influencing the air currents by its warmth, and indeed influencing the whole mood of the room; although I had not consciously seen it before, it had already been structuring my experience.
🎁 Boxing Day was just as the doctor ordered, quiet and restful. ⚘
Boxing Day rainbows, over land and sea, and hanging there in the clouds. 🌈
Just before Christmas breakfast with family this morning.
A Christmas Day double rainbow 🌈🎄
Another Christmas tradition in the bag. I have just finished watching A Charlie Brown Christmas. It was produced 60 years ago in 1965 when I was 2 years old. 🥜️
Since moving to the US I have taken to reading Dylan Thomas’ A Child’s Christmas In Wales each year. My father’s side of my family is from Wales and I lived in South East Wales for 17 years. My home is in Maui, my heart is in Wales.
Reading Thomas’ account of Christmases that he had spent as a child in Wales takes me back to locations that used to be so close, and so common in mentions that I never took much notice of them.
🦉 Thanks to @andycarolan@social.lol I now have quite the collection of Owl Avatars. With the Winter Solstice now past us and Christmas here, I have changed the owl to Winter Owl. He can now take me through the darker and colder months of the year. Thank you Andy. ⚘
Imaginative seasonal car decoration, with a dark turn - two elf legs sticking out the back of this car.
🥧 My search for Mince Pies finally turned up trumps today here on Maui. I now have 9 mini mince pies and 6 standard sized pies in the house. Given that I am the only Englishman in the house and the only person in the family who likes mince pies, I stand to have an enjoyable and tasty next few days. ⚘
I have seen a number of film versions Charles Dickens' A Christmas Carol, but have never read the book. So over the last few days I have had an audio book version, narrated by LeVar Burton, playing in the car. Although I knew the story, I thoroughly enjoyed it. The only thing that I missed were the characters voices not being read in an English accent.
The version of A Christmas Carol that I listened to was a part of the Apple Books Classics series. 📚
If I could have seen the horizon, the sun would have been rising as I took this photograph, rising on the shortest day of the year here in the northern hemisphere.
This train is the Maui Sugar Cane Train that ran on Maui’s West side, taking locals and visitors on a short 7 mile run. In the lead up to Christmas it use to run to Santa Land in the evening to pick up Santa so he could meet the kids. Sadly it stopped running in 2019.
