Happy New Year, dear Friends!

 

My teapot is empty, but held with anticipation.

I prepare by warming the water and choosing the tea.

The tea unfurls and opens for me.

In the quiet of the early morning hour it warms my hands,

Then the first sip of the day.

I breathe

I learn to just BE in the moment

My soul is replenished and I smile.

written by me this week

This is the early morning hour this very week.

 From The Christmas Chronicles by Nigel Slater:

"Everything I have ever wanted is here, right now."

"The cold is making me hungry. I head in, pausing to warm myself by the wood-burning stove in the hall. My request for coffee is sweetly but firmly refused, and I drink green tea from deep cups instead..."

After going for an early morning walk in the cold he finds a coffee shop not yet opened, but enters and sits to wait. "The owner arrives, surprised but apparently unbothered by my having "broken in". She makes me coffee and brings hazelnut cookies shaped in unruly lumps like fat pebbles. A blue woolen blanket for my knees. And then a wafer thin ginger biscuit, coated in the thinnest white icing. Like frost on a roof tile. She lights a small wrought iron stove. I write."

And so it is, life goes on in the most perfect, cozy way and I also write to you, dear friends.

May you be blessed always and in the little things that delight you. May you be served a good cup of coffee or tea and wrapped in a blanket of coziness. Stay warm, savor each day, and above all else dance.

PS: I read The Christmas Chronicles every December, maybe not every word, but select essays that delight my winter, Christmas days.

Happy New Year, dear friends!