1. We finally got a Christmas tree. So far, it only has lights on it, but that’s my favorite part anyway. Also, we waited so long and bought one so late, we got it for $20 off.

2. I was on retreat last week. That’s why I didn’t post this list. It was a bit of a surprise. I hadn’t planned on going this year. I even emailed and told Susan I wasn’t going to make it. She asked if I’d like to come as a program assistant if enough people signed up, and I said yes, but hadn’t heard anything. Then I got an email on Monday asking if I still wanted to come, (the retreat started on Wednesday!) and I said yes. It’s Susan Piver’s Fearlessly Creative Writing and Meditation retreat she does every year at Shambhala Mountain Center. I’ve been the last three years at least and loved it, so I was happy to not actually miss it this time. And being a program assistant gave me a whole other perspective that was very interesting.

3. Apple pie. Eric uses a recipe that calls for apple cider and maple syryp as the sweeteners and it is delicious.

4. Eric.  I commented on the white lights our neighbors wrapped around their tree, about how much l liked them, and the next day when I came home, there were white twinkle lights on two of our trees. As my friend Justine says, I married a good one.

5. My other two boys, Sam and Ringo. They got baths today, because even though Christmas is next week and this is Colorado, it’s sunny and 60 here today and it’s probably been about six months since they had their last bath.

Bonus joy: time off from work, the awareness that when I go back to work I will only have one semester left (!), texting with my brother, wrapping Christmas presents, sitting in the living room when it’s dark out with nothing but the lights on the tree, cookies baked and delivered by our neighbors, writing with Mikalina and Chloe’, “Christmas yoga” at Red Sage Vets, sleeping in, staying up late reading, good books (I just finished All the Names They Used for God, and it was SO good), an appointment for a massage tomorrow, computer glasses, puppies.

1. I have around 22 weeks of work left at CSU. I had a conversation yesterday with someone about taking over a particular project, filled them in on the history of the situation, and something about that made leaving my job at CSU feel real. The closer the end gets, the more and more certain I feel that this was the right thing to do, that the only hope of me staying had passed almost a decade ago.

2. Practice. It is the thing that keeps me going.

When dog therapy and yoga use the same space

Sam, “helping” me meditate

3. Winter food. Don’t get me wrong, I miss my summer garden, but in this cold, dark time of year citrus and things like apple pie and chicken pot pie sustain me.

Apple pie oatmeal. One part oatmeal, one part apple pie, all smushed together

4. Christmas cactus season. Which we actually need to call something else, since they start blooming around Thanksgiving.

5. My three boys. They are my favorite.

There’s a heating vet under our kitchen sink where Ringo likes to hang out when it’s cold

“Can we haz some lunch?”

Bonus joy: good books (finished Children of Blood and Bone and started Heart Berries), good TV (finished Inside Jokes and started season two of Ms. Maisel), good music (the Furns have a new album out), good movies (Eric and I finally saw A Star is Born and even he cried a little at one point), snow, our new mattress holds heat so well we haven’t even had to put the winter blanket on, teaching yoga, aqua aerobics, clean water, heat, electricity, my “new” car, my “new” bathroom, slippers, a soft thick purple bathrobe, being able to ask for what I want, being here for Eric’s birthday (for the past five years, I was away on retreat), getting the laundry done on Friday.