Last Christmas:
I found this unpublished post in my drafts. Instead of the laborious task of publishing it in proper chronological order, I have thrown caution to the wind and allowed it to appear in early September of 2023. If I've done the math properly, it's actually Christmas of 2019 and 2020. Pre- and post-Covid, I suppose. No evidence of unprecedented times; most things carried on as before in the Afelskie household.
Sarah, 7 years old. Mariana, age 3, checking Christmas stockings. Jacob hovering nearby in his 17th year.
I believe that's Joe, age 12.
Jacob receiving one of many books that have proved the staple of all Jacob gift-giving.
Little Joe adorned in Adidas. Who knew what adventures lay in his future? Pax in the foreground, now deceased after an unfortunate biting incident involving a dog and its vaccine-researcher owner. Somehow we ended up with a quarantined dog just as we came out of the first Covid quarantines. The ironies contained within the above paragraph humour me immensely.
Matthew before his waves appeared. He's wearing pyjamas that Simon has now outgrown.
Mariana atop stairs that were still unfinished. I have no memory of the stairs being unfinished before our first Christmas at the farm, but I guess they were.
Isaac, age 9, with one of many remote control cars that broke within the first week of use.
Evidence that Matthew's eyebrows have been with him from the beginning.
A Christmas morning run. I recall that the first kilometre after the turn-around point was spent running blind with my toque pulled over my eyes as the older boys guided me home. Why? No reason other than fun.
A display of Christmas socks.
Same socks, same children,
Was this Christmas day? I will have to check my sources. It is atop the mountain and I believe the Baklinskis were with us.
Christmas day? Christmas holidays. Jogging pants are just as ugly then as they are today. And as I round this out, I realize that this is only Christmas 2019. Unprecedented times still loomed in our future.
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