Today is Monday. Not just any Monday but the Monday a fortnight before Christmas. It’s also a Monday in summer – the most magical time of the year to be in Sydney.
So while I will accept that today is Monday and henace will be a crazy day at work I will also acknowledge that there’s also an undercurrent of shoulders unwinding and brows unfurrowing on the floor and in the lifts and stairs as everyone looks forward to that magical time when beds and wards close and activity winds down around the hospital. The Christmas decorations are up and ward Christmas lunches have been planned (they’re like the lunches you might have at your work only alcohol free and we don’t get dressed up unless it’s to put tinsel or reindeer ears on our heads or garish Christmas ties where more tasteful patterns and muted tones would normally be worn).
‘It’s nearly Christmas’ is the thought that’s on everyone’s minds today as we catch up from the weekend. It’s the thought that keeps us going and keeps us smiling.
So today, I will make a concerted effort to keep my mind on ‘nearly Christmas’ as that not so distant prize on the horizon as I calmly deal with the realities of today.
Nearly Christmas is….
warm summer mornings spent at a favourite cafe playing board games with Preschooler SSG as we sip our respective soothing drinks
it’s time spent with family doing ordinary things but doing them with more laughter than usual because togetherness is a thing of joy
it’s spending the evening at our ‘almost beach’ up the road with our bare feet being hugged warmly by the sand as the waves lap close by
it’s running at dawn down to Rushcutter’s Bay and being lulled into a steady pace by the clank of the boats that loom so close as you round the park
it’s that languid post-run walk home with a cup of coffee in your hand as you try to think of what it is that you have to do when you get hone only to realize that there’s not any urgency to whatever it was because it’s the holidays
Nearly Christmas is also when I get a bit of downtime which I usually spend
swimming before spending twice as long as I did in the pool by its side lounging on a deck chair
being dressed for comfort as I attack the mountain of neglected work reading that’s piled up from The Winter.
Then Nearly Christmas becomes Christmas, bringing it with all of the above plus special moments that instantly become precious memories.
After Christmas and until after the New Years Public Holiday finds me in cycle of three hourly extravagant meals made up of Christmas leftovers, late nights in bed spent reading, hours putting together Lego and doing such frivolous things as hitting the changerooms of fancy stores at the post-Christmas sales.
As the city slowly wakes up, finds its usual high levels of energy and returns to its usual routine so too do I. Begrudgingly and a little reluctantly. But it has to be done. I wonder how fast the break went by and also how fast the year that preceded it went as well.
But being back at the coal face isn’t without its attraction. A whole new year of work means more holidays to be taken and with them new places to be explored or familiar ones revisited.
Today I will think off all this with a smile that reaches my eyes.