The Winter Solstice happened today, Saturday, December 21st, 2024 @ 4:21 a.m. Eastern Time.  Not sure who they get to measure the tilt of the earth’s axis. It is certain I was still in bed at the time notwithstanding the confusion surrounding Eastern Standard Time and Eastern Daylight Time. Accounting more liberally for the difference between standard time and Greenwich Mean Time (and, more profitably still, using my Apple Watch to override it all and to tell me at this instant the precise time in Los Angeles, California) the difference between Eastern Time and us here (whatever we may be called) is the difference between 2:00 pm (here) and 11:00 am (there), so a 3-hour difference. Less than I had anticipated.  I was thinking 4 or 5 hours. Not quite as much as the overnight from Montréal to Paris; that is, between 6 and 8 hours. No matter.  What is certain – that is, for those of us in the Northern Hemisphere (above the equator) – is that we’ve passed the critical low point of the sun’s axis. Now the light begins once again to augment its delivery. The midwinter character now officially abides.

Punctuating the hour as well is a looming visit from a friend from whom we heard only moments ago and whom we expect to arrive burdened with a homemade tourtière pie and relish which we equally anticipate to be homemade, perhaps of the tomato nature to accompany the pie. We have remarkably qualified for this unforeseen gift and unfamiliar expression of Yuletide generosity. Editor’s note: Since writing this piece, the visitor arrived carrying two tourtière pies and two jars of homemade relish (involving celery and onion and, yes, made to go with the pie).

Adjusting to the change of seasons and the change of hours is of course the least of the modifications one encounters on any one day. And though it has been 2 years since we first perched ourselves here overlooking the farmlands stretching to the horizon and the meandering sleepy river, it is nonetheless yet an incomplete adjustment. There is nothing lacking. Other than sufficient time fully to absorb what is now the singular nature of our being. The singularity derives not from its impressiveness but from its definition.

For one thing, people are gone. Though I would never have said that my parents and I were especially close, I nonetheless find that I continue to employ them (or what I imagine to be their projected utterances) to complement so much of what I do and think.  I guess I can safely say that I miss sharing with them howsoever frivolous that correspondence may have been. To clarify: while I would never have bent my opinion or conduct to whatever my parents may have fashioned, I unquestionably enjoyed sharing with them my views and projects.  Perhaps it was their approbation (although as I say I am so bloodyminded that it wouldn’t have made a difference otherwise).

The elephant in the room is naturally the utter inconsequence of what I now do throughout the day.  I will not however pervert that luxury of indolence and inutility to obstruct my way. Instead I wish merely to acknowledge that my profit and purpose are minimal; I am now bordering that uncomfortable state of complete uselessness. I have, for example, absolutely no interest in returning to work.  I didn’t miss it from the moment I walked out the office door for the last time about ten years ago. Much of my penance for being so completely useless is tricycling.  Formerly – like everything else in my life – cycling consumed a great deal more of my day than it now does.  This morning’s performance was strictly 30 minutes (or, if I use my Apple Watch, it was Workout Time 0:32:02 not to be confused with Elapsed Time 0:37:11 during which I must have stopped to chat with someone, likely the grandparents I’ve mentioned on another occasion. Things happen so fast.

And that’s another thing, the clock is interminably ticking. The good news on that front is that we’re rapidly approaching our southern departure date. There is no risk of my wishing my life away. The proximity is but a feature of the attraction, one which like so many hopeful ventures is characterized by a measure of urgency.  But I intend to relish that idle preoccupation because if affords a depth of activity which I’d be foolish to dismiss or overlook when the price is nothing but fleeting images and other magical sensibilities associated with the past. The projection of the future is an impossibility too contradictory to propose. We’re destined to call upon our history to support us while being wielded onto the circuit upon which our coming events are to unfold.

Unless you’re far more astute than I, it’s a crap shoot. It’s a guess knowing what’s to come. Nor is there any use at any age saying that the inevitable is unavoidable. The safer bet is to keep going as long as possible. Defy the odds, the law and the temptation. For while the future is uncertain, chances are the world will tilt for yet another season. This was but a day in your life. And it has kept me absorbed and full of interest.