let February be February
let the second month do it’s thing
let it snow snow snow
let it make me late for work
let it make me happy
with snow covered fields
blue skies
and frigid starry nights
Let February be February
because for good or bad
it’s only twenty-eight days!
copyright 2021 Christopher Donahue
Last January seems almost a lifetime ago. Covid hadn’t struck yet and my wife and I were about to take down the Christmas tree. It was almost February and we were ready. But looking under the tree, we noticed Felix our cat wasn’t ready. Whether it was to take a nap or lying in ambush for his brother Quiet Rustle, Felix liked to hunker down under the tree. And because we liked Felix, my wife and I decided to leave it up a while longer for our furry buddy.
A little over a month later, it was clear the Covid-19 was metastasizing into a pandemic. To dispel the winter and pandemic darkness, we decided to leave the Christmas tree up for the remainder of 2020.
Now here we are. It is still Winter and pandemic dark in these parts. Our little Felix passed away last July.
And we are leaving the Christmas tree up until the pandemic is over.
Copyright 2021 Christopher Donahue
On a wintry January evening, I come home after a hard day at work.
The house is cold and dark. The night, chilly and damp and entirely appropriate for a winter evening. I enter through the back door. For a moment, I wonder if something happened to my cat because he didn’t greet me as soon as I came through the door. But before the thought can turn to worry, Quiet Rustle appears and brushes his greeting against my legs.
I make my way through the darkened house. Normally, I would be turning the lights on as I moved about in the dark. But on a mid-January night like tonight, I go through the rooms turning on the Christmas lights that still hang in the windows. There’s just something wonderful and uplifting seeing the festive lights dispelling the bleak, cold darkness.
And this year, like last, there just seems to be so much darkness to dispel.
Copyright 2021 Christopher Donahue
We are celebrating Christmas this year whether Covid likes it or not. The lights are up in the windows festively dispelling the darkness of this horrible year. Our Christmas tree shines brightly in the corner, as it has been doing all year long. Our celebration will be subdued this year, just my wife, Quiet Rustle our cat, and me. But friends and family will be a call or ZOOM away and our celebration will be filled with Christmas joy. And for that I am thankful.
In January, seemingly a lifetime ago, the world was a different place. The pandemic had not struck yet. And in the pre-Covid winter darkness, we decided to leave our Christmas tree up longer because our beloved little cat Felix liked to hide under it. Whether it was for a nap or a place to ambush his brother, Felix loved to hang out under the tree. So, we decided to leave it up little Feelie. Then March came, the pandemic was raging and we decided to keep the tree up even longer for some much needs cheering-up during the Covid lock down.
Now it is December. Our Christmas tree is shining as brightly as ever, and our hearts go out to all the people who have suffered horribly during the pandemic with the loss loved ones and jobs. In our house, our beloved little Felix the cat did not make it to be under the tree this Christmastime but we treasure his memory, as we do the memory of all our beloved friend and relatives who have passed.
Peace on Earth and Good Will toward all.
Merry Christmas everybody!!!
Copyright 2020 Christopher M. Donahue
my wife, cat and I
having Thanksgiving dinner
just us happy three
copyright 2020 Christopher Donahue
autumn leaves swirl down
Thanksgiving T.V. dinners
covid continues
copyright 2020 Christopher Donahue
Space was the theme of this year’s Friends of the West Roxbury Library Poetry Contest. Here is my contribution that won honorable mention in the adult section.
Felix
the other day
my cat passed away
bundled in his old bed
held snugly in my arms
on the back porch
in the sunshine
the vet administered the shot
and in his new stillness
the space between us
revealed now as
impossible
and
real
copyright 2020 Christopher Donahue
Yesterday, some friends and I hiked up Mt. Monadnock in southern New Hampshire. It was a gorgeous Fall day and the mountain was a wonderful vantage from which to enjoy the foliage.
As we chatted on the socially-distanced hike up, we were astonished that the last time we climbed Monadnock was five years ago. At that time, we founded the Dirty Mountain Bastard (DMB) hiking club. And while we had all hiked somewhere and sometime in the intervening years, we were astonished to realize it had been half-a-decade since the DMBs had all assembled for the first time on that mountainside. The Dirty Mountain Bastards are Robert Christian, Denis Fleming, Dax Bayerd-Murray, and myself.
Much has changed in the world in those five-years. And, it is with a grateful heart that I can appreciate all the Dirty Mountain Bastards are still around and healthy enough to go for a hike!
Onward DMBs!!!
copyright 2020 Christopher Donahue
And off he went into the night…
That was my eighty-nine year old Dad, riding off in an ambulance on the way to the emergency room. It was late on a warm Friday night. We called an ambulance because of discomfort he felt from a routine procedure he underwent earlier in the day. And, because he is eighty-nine years old, we did not want to take chances. The EMTs arrived in a big, box-like van from the fire department. They loaded my father inside. My Dad and I gave each other a wave and an “I love you” and off he went.
But what was really incredible is we couldn’t follow him because of Covid protocols. No visitors in the emergency room. My sister and I were left standing in front of my childhood home wondering if that was the last time we would see him alive. In normal times, we would be frantically getting all our stuff together to go and camp out at the emergency room with him. As word would go out, other family members would stop in at the emergency room and give their support.
But not in the age of Covid.
Now, I’m not arguing with the wisdom of those protocols. Everything worked out fine and my Dad is home happy and healthy. But, it was shocking to be confronted with yet another Covid reality we had not anticipated.
Standing there on a warm night, in quiet sleepy suburbia, with my father taken away, I felt like I was in a Ray Bradbury sci-fi short story. Like the kind I used to read growing up in my childhood home.
The Covid-19 pandemic can not be over soon enough.
Copyright Christopher Donahue 2020
In bad times, it is important to try to focus on what is good and true and beautiful.
Early today, I went out to exercise and enjoy the last of these summer mornings. I Stretching out, I noticed bumblebees on some nearby flowers. There was one bumble per flower. They weren’t moving. I thought they were dead. A poignant reminder summer was coming to an end, Fall and Winter soon to follow.
But then I realized they were sleeping. There was one bumble per flower. The must have been doing their thing when the sun went down and temperature dropped, they just froze in place.
I leaned over and gently breathed on them and they started coming to life.
How cool was that?
Copyright 2020 Christopher Donahue
