The end of the year is time for reflection. I have a few resolutions (another blog to come).

The days will be darker and colder but each day forward will be brighter each day...and that is a hopeful thing to think about.

Lots of things about me have changed. Some of it is due to experience and some of it is due to aging. Some of it is self discovery. I find it interesting that we can still discover things about ourselves as we grow older and that can be a good thing.

When I was a kid the summer was IT: no school, free time, challenging the sun to shine it's hottest rays, long light filled days, sleep. But now, the sunset is calming and the cold feels good. Snow is anticipated.

Christmas changed a bit too. We still had presents even though we intentionally tried to do a few less. Guests arrived with packages and cards and even money for my kids. Wine and spirits and cookies and chocolates overflow my table today. All thought the dinner was spectacular and overwhelming; too full to even taste it all. I have to admit I am the most selfish of all because all of my giving is indulgent to me. All those ohs and ahs are really necessary for me to feel good about it all. I do not have to hear how good it is, I have to see it. I have to see people's eyes close as they savor the taste of a crunchy crab cake or a traditinal bacala salad. I like to see conversations stop due to stuffed mouths and overflowing dishes. I like to know guests are willing to stand in a corner with a plate in order to eat their dinner. (I never have enough room). I like the requests and phone calls to please put aside some stuffed calmari for Jean-Paul as he is racing here late after a mass at his church but worried all the same he may miss his favorite dish (compliments of my mom). To me it is easy to give. It is harder than we all realize to receive and show the appreciation that is hoped for, but my family and friends have that down pat! I get the most heartfelt appreciation. I can safely say my giving is not so altruistic.

The best is the fun. I could have threw two or three dishes together and it would have been just as fun. On the contrary,lots of the fun is preparing the huge dinner with my husband (and this year, my kids even helped) for almost two days we chopped and baked and fried and grilled. It causes a stir, an excitment, an anticipation; adreneline rushes and tradition lives on. WE ALL DO IT because we want to feel the love that radiates around the room. WE want to give and receive the enormity of feelings we have for one another. We want to say, before the year ends, "we want you to know.......".

The religious celebration makes us feel pensive and humble.

The food and the gifts are just outpourings of love glue that keeps us stuck together.

It doesn't matter who does the cooking and who does the eating or who does the giving and who does the receiving. It's all glue. It's all love. It's all good.

Everything can change, but not the language that we carry inside us, like a world more exclusive and final than one's mother's womb.

French with English subtitles..
the settings are great..cafes, restaurants, city streets (Paris) and french apartments. The colors are vivid and every scene is shot with utmost care and thought. This was funny in a French way; a different way. I loved it. Audrey Tauton was great. She is beautiful. I loved her haircut. I'd like to see more movies by this director.

I realized...I did see a couple of his other movies
Delicatessen (weird but good)
A Very Long Engagement (also with Audrey Tauton). I remember liking it but do not remember the details of the movie

He is said to be making a movie adaptation of the book The Life of Pi...one of my favorite books! Can't wait for that one.

It has been a while that a movie has really touched me so much.

See this on a large screen TV if you can...it is beautiful.

The world and all it's ridiculousness includes India in many ways. This movie tells about how one country treats women, especially it's Hindu widows. Hope comes from an outside thinker, a hero, one who can literally see through the atrocities.

I am always deeply interested in magnifying cultures and the study of different traditions and religions.

I am always shocked to see the similarities that weave their way through the world in every culture, every religion and every socioeconomic level.

It really is scary but something I know is true for us all.

I thought this one of the best movies I've ever seen. Deepa Mehta is a wonderful director.

There is a line from the show "Six feet Under" that goes like this.."Why do people have to die?" the widow asks. "To make life special", the undertaker answers.

Death really does change how we see things. Death MAKES us appreciate Life's subtleties. We remember the dead doing very ordinary things BUT now those daily habits and rituals are somehow magnified and admired.

Joyce is a lady I worked with at the remediation center before I went to Nursing school. She was a reading specialist. Young looking, extremely pleasant and kind, she LOVED the kids. Her hair was long and reddish brown. She wore long flowing skirts and pretty tops with flowers or butterflies. She looked like she could have been a hippie in her teenage years. She seemed to go perfect with another teacher there named John. Sometimes John would roll his eyes at Joyce's flightiness but I knew he was deeply in love with her, he just needed to get her to understand it. This is what I would think about as I typed reports and watched them in passing.

She always answered a request with a "I'd be delighted" or "you got it!" or "nothing would make me happier".

I loved working there. I loved all the eccentric psychologists and therapists and I loved Joyce. She treated me like her girlfriend but with a bit of protective happy distance. I felt like her niece or something like that because she shared lots of things with me like her lunch or flowers or even a walk to the store but, of course, kept things from me as well. We talked a lot about me because she was always so interested in my thoughts and my goals and my family and my boyfriend. She'd dismiss herself as a homebody or boring or a nothing much to tell about kind of person.

One night me and a couple of the ladies from work were invited to Joyce's for dinner. She lived in an apartment on Broad Street with her cat. At 18, I thought this was just the coolest thing on earth......like "That Girl" (my favorite childhood show). The apartment was in a grand four story home with double doors at the entrance. Joyce ran up the steps and with high energy unlocked the doors. I was envious of the multitude of her keys. Inside, the large wooden stairway took us up to the second floor. The back apartment was sunny and cheery. Homemade curtains, and an old fashioned freestanding stove that separated the kitchen and living room. A bedroom was off the living room and a tiny bathroom was filled with plants and sweet smelling soaps. We had a lovely dinner with wine and I could not wait to get my life started; my independent life...with lots of keys and a great apartment and maybe even a pet.

On the way home, I mentioned my admiration of Joyce. I wondered aloud about her sweetness and how nice it must be to have such a content life; a decidedly quiet, happy, purposeful life.

By the time I got to my front door I was told Joyce's story, the real story. Joyce was married. Her husband was also a teacher. They were in love and together they happily had a child, a little girl, Molly. Joyce's husband and four year old Molly were both killed in a car accident. Joyce was devastated and her life literally fell apart. She stopped eating and working. She stopped smiling and eventually she stopped crying. She was at rock bottom and never wanted to get up. She lost the will to live. And she almost died. A hospital stay and a therapist got her to, little by little, begin again. It was about 7 years later that I met Joyce. She was at a point where how she looked at life made a big difference to her future. She was devoting herself to other needy children and she was doing a wonderful job.

Afterward, I realized I saw her life as I wanted to see it. Now, it all seemed different. She and John really had no interest in one another. She was a bit airy and flighty but that was her sing songy way of pacing herself in some daily happiness. At night, she was really exhausted and probably haunted by her missing husband and child. She probably fought loneliness on a daily basis.

Whenever I pass that home on Broad Street (almost every day), I think of Joyce. I think of a high energy, happy, extremely sweet person and I always wish her well.