Hogswatch

The light drains from a washed out sky. We huddle with intermittent cats. A small real tree on the porch, scavenged from the free pile of the garden center around the block. Neighbor told me about it. I'll see if any are left tomorrow, and snag another one to compost. Good for the soil. I've learned not to bring piney greenery inside at Yule, my sinuses object. I knew my arms would rash from being poked by fir tree needles, but didn't connect that with a christmas runny nose. Now, I leave it outside.

Lots of sugar at work and pizza from our anesthesia director. I ate a peppermint meringue, the rest was too much. Nurse manager got everyone a card and a chocolate bar, and something else that hasn't arrived. She wouldn't tell us what. She wished us Merry Christmas, and I replied Good Yule, Happy Solstice. She's Jewish, I'm agnostic, but what the hell. There are lots of holidays, next year I'm thinking of celebrating Yaldā. I finished up just before 1500, and the last two rooms looked to be done within an hour or so. The three surgeons working got labeled as Scrooge and Grinch, and Marley(which puzzled a number of people who didn't recognize Jacob Marley as Scrooge's dead partner.) They reminded me to come in on Wednesday. Oh, I'll remember.

Lots of dreams last night, I had to do a research project that was due that afternoon, and I didn't even know the criteria. Thought I'd do something on weather, but then it became a work project. Cats walked through the dreams, and I was in a vacation house with two toilets, but I couldn't get to either with any privacy.

This is in part my introvert nature asking for time away from people. It's not physical exhaustion, although with my several little injuries it sort of is. It's emotional emptiness, which only solitude can replenish. This is not enough to refill, although I'll make it work as a stopgap.

Again this year, today, we got a christmas card in the mail, in a shaky hand, with an easily misread address, meant for the senior center up the street. Again, Dylan decided to just walk it over rather than send it back through the post. An S and a 5 do look similar, too bad it should be a 7.

We will do something for Hogmanay, maybe.