A Quiet Christmas - 2025
The last day of autumn. Ah. A few days before Christmas. Eep! Sometimes it is hard to know if this year is different because of life in a tiny house, or because the world is changing. Probably both. The weather around the Salish Sea has spawned floods and slides. Today was cold, which meant a good day for the hours required for baking beans. Besides, it was supposed to be cold, windy, and rainy. More reasons to stay indoors. - And realize I haven't put up any decorations. Oops.
It is evening as I type. Pots and dishes are drying. I'm finally out of my grubbies and into heavy sweats. I actually opened a beer. Radical. The day was filled with chores that I am only now recognizing as gifts.
Diet, ugh. More for medical reasons than vanity, I have to be careful about what I eat. Don't worry; I'll spare you the details. But my diet is a good reason to make my own baked beans. It is cheaper and easier to buy them in a can. It certainly takes less time. Baking beans means I know almost everything that goes into the pot. The only prepared part was tomato sauce. Gluten-free is the thing. I make my own stock, use duck fat I saved from Thanksgiving, buy herbs and spices from friends who own a spice shop (DandelionBotanical.com), start with dried beans, and a bunch of other basic ingredients that make baking beans an event.
Baking beans is a time-consuming event, at least the way I do it. Start the prep after breakfast. Chop onions and mushrooms, sweated. Start throwing in the rest. About an hour later, finally get my big cast iron dutch oven into my convection oven, and check it in about an hour. Then another, and another, and enough hours that the beans are ready to cool and store an hour before dinner. Not cheap. Not quick. Homemade, and no need to get the glasses out to read the label.
It may be a tiny house, but about two of those hours went to house chores that are usually ignored until I'm trapped indoors for some reason. Change the bedding. Dust. Sweep the floors - including the corners I usually skip.
An hour for cleaning the kitchen. Another hour for making and eating lunch. A nap, which I fell into hard enough that waking up was momentarily unnerving.
And the day warmed up, the sunshine hit the house, the winds died, and the storms decided to hit other parts of the Olympic Peninsula.
And the beans kept baking.
Hmm. In the meantime, pump up the bike tires with my self-gifted pump. Notice that the weather was still nice, chilly, but dry. Almost as a stunt, I mowed the lawn - in December. Cool. Most of the lawn was dormant, but strips beside the house were warm enough to distract me.
Check off a few more chores. Realize there was time to get out the exercise mat. Move some furniture around so I could stretch and such. Feel weary as I ate dinner. Get a text from someone wondering why I wasn't at the dance. Realize I missed the dance. Feel a few moments of regret. And then feel full, less weary, and somewhat contented.
When I lived in a big house, decorating would take weeks. There was more for the neighbors to judge. Cleaning took days, not hours. There was no spare time until January. I’d rather not wait.
I can't have a party in my small house, but I have gained the time to do things like bake beans for six hours-ish. A long string of chores were checked off. Bills had to be paid, but were less of an issue. Cleaning happens, but relatively quickly. I can't store as much, but I just froze eight helpings of beans, and have ideas for more meals.
I had more time to do what I want to do, and sometimes have to remind myself that something that feels like a chore can actually be me gifting me something.
Sure, there's no room for a tree. The fireplace is electric, and can't be run while the oven is on because they will blow the breaker. I miss having parties, but there's a value to quiet time, too.
Pardon me as I count. - over eighteen. In the 'on deck circle' beside my monitor is a stack of ~18 DVDs for me to watch through the holidays. There are more on streaming. They are measures of time that I'll take for myself as I celebrate this time of year.
I am also glad that the power is on, the storms have quieted, and that there's a dance tomorrow where I might be celebrating with whichever friends show up. It's all good.