Spent a great part of today chasing the dragonflies along the Boulder Creek in Boulder, Co. They were everywhere. I thanked this one for being so patient and letting me get up close and personal.

Red Dragonfly

The dogs at play in winter

Ball on a wire…

View of the mountains from Golden Ponds Park and Nature Area, Longmont, CO

My grandmother amazes me and inspires me, proving that Arizona heat, Pabst Blue Ribbon beer, and wine by the gallon really can keep you alive. Her family, including me, are also a great part of what keeps her going by providing her emails, phone calls, and visits.

She still lives in her own apartment, moving to a first-level unit only three or four years ago. About the same time as she moved downstairs, she quit driving (after coaxing from medical professionals and her children). The year she was caught speeding, I joked that the photo-radar ticket she got should have been converted into a Christmas card.

As her eyesight starts failing her she resorts to bright flashlights and an oral recounting of her surroundings by the closest family member. She still reads emails and still forwards the funny ones. She plays Scrabble three times a week and to keep her mind active when she’s alone she runs through the alphabet – first thinking of girls names beginning with each letter of the alphabet and then again with boys names. She spends her time worrying about and thinking about what each of her grandchildren are doing, asking each of us our daily routine so she can go through it in her mind.

She asks, “what’s this, on my plate?” frequently, pointing with her arthritic index finger and bakes her famous chocolate chip cookies for special occasions. She wants to be, and usually is, included in every conversation. It was great spending New Year’s Eve with my grandma. What a way to start 2010.

My partner assembles the pole, the stand, and then inserts each branch into holes drilled into the silver painted wooden pole. Each branch is capable of holding more than one ornament, allowing the tree to hold years of our memories as a couple and as individuals.

This year in particular, as I hang a kiln-fired plastic santa made for me in 1979, I think of all the other memories that have hung from this trees’ branches before it came into our lives – what shapes, sizes, and colors represented those memories.

I think about the first Christmas. The first time each branch was unpacked from the pressed brown sleeves and pristine condition of the silver pole and the crisp, un-aged, cardboard box. Who was present for that inaugural set up? Did the tree sit in front of a picture window in a house on a cul-de-sac? Did they have kids or did they expect them?

Then the first transition of ownership comes to mind. Who inherited the tree? Did it go away to college? Did it stay lost in crawl-space or sit through several summers of garage sales, a flea market, or an auction? How did this tree find its way to my living room. How did this tree become our tradition?

I try not to base my thoughts about how long this tree spent in any one home on my own experience with artificial trees – my parents have had the same tree since before bringing me home in a laundry basket. Their tree, with individual plastic pine needle clusters, is stabilized by twine bows around two wooden sticks running along the trunk painted nearly the same color as the tree’s trunk as if the tree were in traction. It still leans awkwardly. My parents tree is sparse, both in the number of branches and ornaments. They have slowly started letting my sister and I hold onto ornaments distinctly ours.

Is this what happened to that silver tree? Did the importance slowly shift from the sparkling silver tree to the ornaments hanging from each branch? What once made the tree radiant – the spinning color-changing spotlight and the aluminum foil pom-pom burst at the end of each branch, simply faded, allowing the tree to transition to another home to collect and gather family and feelings, absorbing memories.