{"id":1813,"date":"2012-12-24T13:13:33","date_gmt":"2012-12-24T02:13:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.wordpress.com\/?p=1813"},"modified":"2013-06-17T19:53:17","modified_gmt":"2013-06-17T19:53:17","slug":"welcome-in-the-cold-dark-night","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/?p=1813","title":{"rendered":"Welcome in the Cold Dark Night"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Solstice<\/a> It’s strange. A lot of people say that I’m an excellent writer, but even I – at my best, can’t capture the essence of being home for the holidays for the first time in nearly three years. I can try, but it won’t work, because every time I think of something to say, I lose the thread of it.<\/p>\n

It has been a long time since I was home for Christmas. I’d forgotten the little things that make it so special. I’d forgotten what it was like to make sugar cookies with my mum, ending up with flour everywhere and far fewer cookies than we intended because I forgot to take the last batch out of the oven. I’d forgotten what the smell of a real tree was like, and how long it took to find a 12 foot noble fir in the first place. Forgotten what it was like to stand in the Christmas tree lot in the drizzling west coast rain, feet squelching in the mud…looking at tree after tree…too short, too tall, too wide, not wide enough.<\/p>\n

Because of the new car, we had the trees delivered this year, but it still took us three trips to the lot to find the tree in the first place.<\/p>\n

It took three days to decorate it, and I’d forgotten just how many boxes were in the attic. When I was a child, Christmas just happened, I have little memory of how hard my mother must have worked, and how little help she must have had. There were a lot of times when things were hard…but somehow, Christmas was always what it was ‘supposed’ to be<\/p>\n

It always comes, somehow or other…it comes without ribbons, it comes without tags, it comes without packages , boxes or bags…<\/p>\n

I’d forgotten so many things, and now that I have them, I cant think of a thing to say about any of them. Some moments can’t be written down, you just have to live them.<\/p>\n

However you spend your holidays…I hope they find you well and happy.<\/p>\n

Welcome Christmas while we stand, heart to heart and hand in hand…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It’s strange. A lot of people say that I’m an excellent writer, but even I – at my best, can’t capture the essence of being home for the holidays for the first time in nearly three years. I can try, … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[21],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1813","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-vacation"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3GtNE-tf","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1813","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1813"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1813\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2347,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1813\/revisions\/2347"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1813"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1813"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bloodinyoursaltwater.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1813"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}