Christmas Comes to the Arboretum

What a day it was! The sun came out and the temperatures warmed up and on the first really decent-weather day in almost a week, we had the same great idea that everybody else did: to go into town and treat ourselves to a fine lunch at Olive Garden.

The place was packed when we got there, and we arrived plenty early. It is the week between Christmas and New Year's, and many people in this University town are off on holiday. Me, I'm one of the lucky ones; I'm on permanent holidays now that I'm retired. :-)

So my husband and I found a booth in a corner, and had a lovely meal: spaghetti and meatballs and pasta fagioli for him, and fettuccine alfredo and salad for me, and for both of us those amazing breadsticks that were soft and salty and flavorful and addictive.

What's not to like when you're enjoying a great meal (at a reasonable price) with your favorite guy, who looks at you like you're his queen, as he passes you yet another marvelous buttery breadstick? And suggests - oh yeah, baby - since this was so good, why don't you just grab another one of those fettuccine-to-go things to take along home?

We ran the errands we had to, and then he dropped me off at the Arboretum at Penn State. It was my first visit there since mid-September. I am sorry to say I have only visited the Arboretum 8 times this year. I missed the entire autumn show on the Penn State campus this fall, possibly the first time that's happened since before I went there in 1982. Mea culpa, I'll try to do better next year!

But oh, it was good to be back! And I took some friends along: T. Tiger and four Christmas mice came with me, and they romped and played and posed for photos on the bird statue in the new pollinator gardens, and admired the views through the garden kaleidoscope. Some of the trees are decorated with snacks for the birds, and there are garlands and other festive things everywhere.

I tried to take them in to play on the Christmas tree inside the Glass House in Childhood's Gate, but alas, the doors were locked, but above is a pretty view from the outside. Let me add a personal note that when the weather gets VERY cold, I worry about this Glass House shattering. When it was -2 degrees F the other night, I thought about it a lot more. But here it stands! Let's hope that continues to be the case!

The construction project next door is turning into the new art museum, and while I'm sure it will be awesome when it's done, construction is sort of an interesting eyesore on the landscape. I find my eyes both drawn to and put off by the project. SOMEDAY there will be art here, and I will go have a look. That will be a happy day: art and Arboretum, side by side and intertwined!

It was a fine visit and not really too crowded. There were families making snowmen, and every pathway was a combination of slushy and/or frozen. So if you go, please watch your step, as you may encounter wintry conditions unexpectedly that send you spinning, slipping, or sliding.

And then it was time to go home, but the day had one more wonderful show in store for us, which was to say a winter sunset that boggled the eyes and mind. I was indoors but the colors came in to get me. Suddenly, there was pink and purple everywhere.

The sky turned into a lake of fire, and then it worked its way through every color of the rainbow. All of the stuff that had melted during the warm afternoon was freezing up nearly instantly as darkness began to fall, so I ran outside, picking my way carefully along the icy trails in our yard, my eyes looking up at the sky, so as to be lifted up!, and then looking down at my feet, so as not to fall, or die. Picture ME singing Glory, Glory, Hallelujah!!!

Many years ago, I saw a great big rainbow that stretched across town while I was driving up Atherton Street, and it was so huge and so gorgeous and so magnificent, that I just knew that if all of us stopped and looked at it, and took shelter under that beautiful thing made of light together, there would be World Peace. Yes, this was THAT special!

How do I put a bow on a day such as this, with its fine food, its winter garden adventures, its amazing sunset? Well, I'm out of extra photos, or I'd show you some more of this gorgeous day, such as the sunset that seemed a harbinger of peace or something. But I can give you some song links that tell the story of the day.

First, for the photo above, let's have 38 Special, with Back Where You Belong, for THIS is where I DO belong: in one of my favorite places, doing what I love. And for the amazing sunset that the whole world could take shelter under, and left me singing Glory Glory, let's have TWO songs: first one for the rocker in me and a second one for the Methodist girl: the Rolling Stones, with Gimme Shelter (a personal fave of myself and my friend The Boot, as she and I intended to come back in our next lives as Mick's back-up girl singers) and Fernando Ortega, with Creation Song. How's THAT for a mash-up for ya!?? Singing glory, glory. . . . . .

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