Your dreams are safe now.....

I took an empty coffee can with me to the club. Barreled through the front doors looking like all of a beggar. Set it up on the bar. And waited. One by one the bottle caps arrived. Heinekens, Michelobs, Coors, Red Dog, Buds, obscure beers I've never heard of. In half a set, the can was full and I sealed her up. Secured the little plastic lid. Done Deal.

Every now and then a new cap would plunk down on the countertop. Some hit the lid, others like stray cats at a dumpster, loitered close and then fell behind the bar, on the floor, or just disappeared all together.

At midnight, I swept the bar with my eyes. Scanned their faces. And then gathered up their bottled stories and daydreams and brought them home with me. I plunked through my treasure chest of colored caps, my fingers listening to them tink.....metal sea shells.....And went to sleep.

This morning I knew.

I started hammering at first light.

The neighbors, out for coffee, hollered over....."Hey, Sing, there's a damn woodpecker on your porch!"...... "Mmmmmmm,hmmmmmmm" I mumbled to the morning air, barely aware they had spoken, hammering.....66 bottle caps, 207, 303 and more.......each little trinket getting three hearty and soulful bangs for good luck....

And then she was done.

Peace.
That's what I wish for you my friends.

Yes, Virginia......

I started. Don’t say a word. I know it’s early, but it just felt right. I plugged my little vintage fireplace in, with the crackling snapping tinsel twirling on a shish-ka-bob skewer, and hauled the tree onto the porch…..and then....Ta! Dah! Years of mardis gras beads dangle from her fronds, and tethered there, like winter wind chimes….our ornaments…..plaster molds of little hands, kindergarten pictures in macaroni frames, my Mama’s glass church…..ballet slippers, an American flag from Desert Storm, a slice from the trunk of my very ever first Christmas tree….coasters from the corner bar…the cork from "that" bottle of pink champagne...

It felt like Christmas today, so I stayed in my pajamas and sock feet and blasted CD’s and smiled. I emptied the Ho!Ho! Closet onto the hall floor and giggled. I wrapped and wrapped and wrapped. Laughing out loud in my empty house. The tradition continues, and like love, it grows…..

Pass the trash….

Shopping in my cupboards, my closets, my kitchen garbage can……