The most wonderful time of the year!

Everything good happens between late November and early January. Not everything good, I guess – I really love the summer time – but this is the most festive, and my most favorite, time.

This season of joy started with shocking sadness. In addition to the horrific violence in the middle east, my hometown of Lewiston, Maine was the latest American community rocked by gun violence. In a reminder that most people are good, with little prompting my wonderful sometime employer traveled to north to perform at the Lewiston High School’s football game with their biggest rival from across the river, Auburn (I actually grew up in Auburn, but they’re one and the same in these cases.) Seeing JT with the Lewiston High School principal, my dear childhood friend Jon, before taking the field to sing the anthem had me not just teary, but actually weeping with gratitude and love.

Thanksgiving was a wonderful trip to the Berkshires and Connecticut, which included family, dear friends, great food, many walks in the woods and one up my favorite mountain (Monument Mountain).

A week later I celebrated my birthday with brunch, a night at the santa bar, and setting up my christmas tree (and s’mores with students from CIM).

A couple days later, I was boarding a flight to London. If you know anything about me, you know I don’t plan trips very far in advance (indeed, I planned a trip for this weekend while I was in London last weekend). But this trip has been on the books for months. It was a whirlwind of friends and music and many, many drinks.

In the very early ’90s I worked with the conductor Marin Alsop in her spectacularly fun Too Hot to Handel, a Gospel Messiah. I’ve seen the work at least a dozen times and listened to a bootleg recording of it every holiday season. At lunch with Marin a couple years ago, she mentioned that it would have it’s European debut at Royal Albert Hall in 2023 and I pledged to be there. Nicola and Tiffany, my steadfast British besties, who have never turned down a good time, secured a box for the concert and we hatched the plan to make the most of a long weekend visit.

Arriving off an overnight flight, I walked into their flat to see my sixtieth birthday celebration. Um – I’m not 60, I reminded them. No, I’m sure you are, the generally always right Tiffany insisted and it actually made me think twice, but I am not. Nicola shuffled away the balloon and card to save for a few years (I got to keep my present, which was something delightful).

That night, after Tiffany madly texted our concert companions that it was not actually my 6oth birthday, we headed for Royal Albert. London takes the holidays seriously and if it was hard to escape christmas spirit before the concert, it was impossible to after.

Day two of the visit included a very long lunch with views of the whole city(Hutong is delicius) and many, many rounds of drinks, following by the kind of night out that I haven’t done since my 20s. “You want to go to French Mama for drinks tonight?” “Sure” “Great, we’ll head over around 11pm!” In for a penny, in for a pound, but man was it fun!

Day three gave us time for a little lay-in and a day at the theatre. We went to see one of the most American of shows – Guys and Dolls – in the most spectacular of productions. A nice Thai meal near the Tower Bridge and led to an early night of Strictly Come Dancing (Dancing with the British Stars) and a much needed early to bed! (it’s possible we drank a bit throughout the day as well).

Day four came. It’s hard to say what I was most looking forward ot in the weekend, but it may well have been our afternoon with ABBA! We went to the spectacular, immersive ABBA Journey, in its venue specially built to house the virtual reality band (the music was performed by ABBA-tars), as well as a live band, singers and about 5000 of us dancing our hearts out. We were scheming about this last spring in Jordan and several of our travel companions joined us for a mini-reunion. I love meeting people on my travels (I also connected with a friend with whom I was in Nepal and one from Peru while I was in town). The people who like to do the kind of travel I like to do are always interesting, and this group was no exception! After our ABBA night, one of our group jumped a plane for Lapland and another to Namibia – you guys think I travel a lot, but i have nothing on these women! No photos were allowed, but trust me when I say that dancing to ABBA for two hours will cure anything that ails you!

That night, with Dancing Queen ringing in our ears (not to mention the Hallelujah Chorus and “I got the horse right here”) I watched my very first ever episode of Dr. Who. It did live up to the hype. On the flight home I watched The Big Lebowski, also for the very first time, and it also lived up to the hype.

Less than a week after coming back across the pond, I spent less than 40 hours across the country. A quick zip to the Pacific Northwest included a bit more music, more drinks, and best of all – I learned how to poach fish – one that we secured, frest caught from the Public Market!

Now I’m home and not going anywhere for eleven more days (it will be a quiet Cleveland Christmas for me), when I’ll be headed off for a chilly New Year adventure in Iceland. Not a new country for me, but one I always look forward to. In the meantime, I look forward to resting my liver and eating a lot of salads!

Happy holidays my friends!