It's beginning to look a lot like...?

We find Small Business Saturday much more appealing than Black Friday. For more years than we remember we've been supporters of local foods and local economies. We're not sure, but we think it may go back to having lived for about a decade in a small town in Massachusetts when we were young. As near as we recall, the closest we came to having a "big box" store in those days in that place was an A&P grocery. In fact, for the most part, those days were pre-bigbox, except possibly for Lechmere Sales in a suburb North of Boston, near Cambridge, MA.

sparkling white pines

Photo by J. Harrington

Today the Better Half joined us in an excursion to one of our favorite local stores, Scout & Morgan books in Cambridge, MN. We were surprised at the crowds inside the store when we arrived a little before midday. It was actually crowded no doubt in part due to the sale they're having for those regulars who subscribe to their email newsletter. We left without making any purchases. Our conscience remains guilty because of the stacks of unread and partially read books we've accumulated over the past year or two. The Better Half more than compensated for our Scrooge-like behavior. There was a book of Ted Kooser's, Kindest Regards, new and selected poems that caught our eye, but we have on our shelves most of the volumes from which poems were selected. In fact, we're currently rereading Kooser's Winter Morning Walks: one hundred postcards to Jim Harrison. Depending on which other books arrive at Christmas, we may well reconsider Kindest Regards before year's end. After all, it does include a number of new poems. We'll think about that glass as being half full.

our "Charlie Brown" Christmas tree

Photo by J. Harrington

On this locally dreary Thanksgiving weekend Saturday, the last traces of snow have been washed away by our rains. A murder of crows is returning to their Winter roost in our woodlot. But, our Christmas tree is up and decorated, and, thanks to the Better Half, with some aiding and abetting by yr. obt. svt., we have the place brightened inside and out with Christmas lights twinkling like Summer's fireflies. The picture near the top of this posting is the one we promised a day or so ago of using driveway trees as decorations. (By the way, the lights twinkle but don't flash. We can't stand flashing Christmas lights.) The inside tree is a for real "Charlie Brown" Christmas tree, a scrawny white pine sapling from our own property, sparsely decorated by Herself. It has its own poetic, artisanal charm that's growing on us.

At least one of the poems in Winter Morning Walks makes it clear that our North Country isn't the only place to experience dark, cloudy November days. We're grateful the weather's not worse, that there are poets like Kooser and local shops nearby that sell poetry. We're also grateful that our Better Half has the artistic sense to push us out of our routine daily walkings and into Charlie Brown's world where we can experience the beauty and joy of something different, our home-grown tree decorated in a simple, old-fashioned way.

november 18

Cloudy, dark and windy


Walking by flashlight
at six in the morning,
my circle of light on the gravel
swinging side to side,
coyote, raccoon, field mouse, sparrow,
each watching from darkness
this man with the moon on a leash.

from Winter Morning Walks, by Ted Kooser

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