Twelfth Night

Tonight is the last night of Yule, so we are preparing. First, the tree came down and was hauled into the compost area to become both compost and the Yule log for next season. Then we cleaned the house, returning all of the small parts—shoes, paper clips, notebooks, seed catalogs— to their proper places. I cleared off the table, removing the seasonal table runner;  it will be bare until Candlemas. We washed all of the floors. Yesterday, Mark did a huge load of laundry at the Laundromat (our washer is broken) so all of the sheets and towels are clean. I made a food plan and went grocery shopping, then I cleared out several binders of old council papers. The old year has passed.

          

      Tonight, we will have our last Yule fire, burn the last section of 2017’s tree, and toss the now dry greens from the mantle in. The paperwhites we planted on Solstice night are up.  We will look through our cards once more and burn them as well, keeping a few for name tags for presents. We will eat the last two holiday chocolates for desert and finish reading A Christmas Carol. And then, on Monday, time begins again. I will clean out the ashes of the fires and spread them on a garden bed. School starts; a new council term starts; meetings and discussions begin once more. Happy New Year!