Them Days Be Getting Longer Yet?

Mid-January, and the Seasonal Affective Disorder is kicking in something fierce.  I think it's because I managed to spend the major transition week, climate-wise, in Costa Rica where the temperatures were reminiscent of early August.  I usually get cabin-feverish this time of year, get a little rusty and tired, but this winter's been harsh.  I started taking multi-vitamins and vitamin D in the end of November, hoping to ward off this spectre.  It's interesting.  The vitamin D, in a double-dose, does just a little bit to help, by which I mean that when I'm taking it and proceeding to walk up the street to work (20 minute walk) in -5 centigrade weather with the snow falling, I am perfectly conscious of two things.  The first is that the weather is absolutely miserable.  The second is that I should be more upset about this.  I threw ginseng into my morning routine, making me feel like a borderline supplement junkie.  I can't say whether or not any of it is doing any good... I've already managed to get sick four times since September. 
I find particular joy, however, in walking back to the train after work.  In the mornings, this walk feels like a long hike uphill with eight hours to put in before I get any real reprieve.  At the end of the day, I walk southward, toward the lake.  In December, I walked to the train in darkness, in the light of streetlamps and headlights.  In January, I see the days getting longer, literally.  That carries with it some promise, that soon it will be March, and then May, and then I'll be able to pull my mountain bike out of my parents' garage and start feeling right again.  I try not to remember how many months away that is.  It's difficult when every fiber of my being is aching for catharsis.  A few years ago I took up mountain biking.  If I play my cards right, this year it'll be whitewater kayaking.  I'm aching to climb some rocks and trees and play in some rivers and swim in non-chlorinated water and jump off things and seek vengeance on the rollerblade trail that tore up my knee last summer, all at once.
Alas, it is mid-January.  My activity levels are limited to (are you ready?):  yoga, in my living room; yoga, in a yoga studio; running on a treadmill; lifting weights; any gym-friendly exercises; any living room friendly exercises; and when the money comes, I might get in a day of skiing this year.  I suppose if my masochistic side comes out and decides it craves a good chill to the bones, I may venture out skating.  I think I'm starting to understand peoples' compulsion toward New Year's Resolutions.  By the new year, people have been breathing the indoor air just long enough to be dissatisfied and are itching for change.  Any change.  If their promise coincides with the new calendar getting hung on the wall, they may even convince themselves that the next major holiday, Easter, is closer than it seems.
This post has no real point.  How self-indulgent of me to post something as silly as an idle musing about hating winter.  And how unoriginal!  Perhaps I can at least end this on a somewhat smile-provoking note.

As I walk down the street to my train after work, after the novelty of lengthening daylight fades (as does the daylight), I can always count on hearing two sounds:  sirens and car horns.  I'm almost jaded enough to tune them out like the rest of the urban population, but I'm not quite there yet.  I still look up when I hear a horn honking, and it's infuriating in Toronto because people will honk their horns for almost no reason at all.  Last week as my happy headspace got interrupted by an obnoxious car horn I looked up, and a thought crossed my mind.  The driver honking the horn was driving a super-expensive European SUV, and I thought "wow!  He must really be going places, owning a car like that.  Except that he's not going anywhere.  Because he's stuck in Toronto.  At rush hour."  I'd love for someone to write a haiku about that.  Good job, sir, you made my evening.

Christmas Nostalgia

So, it's Christmas Eve for those of us on the Julian calendar.  My husband and I spent the evening having dinner with my Mom and brothers.  It was a quiet evening.  There were perogies, and there was some wine.  It was nice, but awkward.
The last few years have been riddled with awkward Christmas Eves.  First my Grandfather went to live in the nursing home, and the evening found itself shortened a little, as family left early to drive him back home at the end of the night.  It was a sharp contrast to the days he used to drink a glass too many by the end of the night and need help back down "home" to the basement, where he had an apartment set up.  Then my Grandmother died.  That was a tough one to swallow for me, and six years later I still sit at that table remembering her sitting across from me, pleading with my cousin, Tammy, to at least eat a bite of everything, chastising my Grandfather for his politically incorrect comments at the table and just being her wonderful self.  Then my Aunt and Uncle moved to BC with our cousins.  We knew that one was coming, but it hit home for me when they weren't there for Christmas.  After they moved, nobody came to invade our home at 4 in the afternoon with every piece of kitchenware she could dream up, enlisting every able-bodied male in sight to carry it all into the house.  My Aunt Natalie and my Mom used to follow each other around our kitchen yelling at each other about everything and nothing until the meal was over.  To an unfamiliar ear it would sound like an uncomfortable territorial battle, but I think they both enjoyed it.  We'd be promised at 5 p.m. that dinner would be ready in 20 minutes, and we'd finally sit down to eat around 8 p.m., when dinner was ready.  Our cousins, Danylo and Anton, would hang out with us in front of the television while my Uncle, Phil, told us of his travels, or spoke to Dula about golf.  My Uncle Yaro would come for dinner, with our cousins, Andrei and Tammy, in tow (or any available variation thereof).  When Natalie, Phil, Danylo and Anton moved out West, the celebration grew quiet.
Last year Yaro broke his ankle in the beginning of December.  My Grandfather was no longer well enough to leave the nursing home for the evening.  We visited my Grandfather after a modest meal, nothing that resembled the feasts we used to have, and then my parents went to Church while I drove out several cities over, to visit with Yaro and my Aunt Billie.  Yaro was still couch-ridden with his injury, and after years of his trekking down to our home on Christmas Eve, making the trip was the least I could do. 
I'm a bit of a bowl of mush when it comes to this stuff.  For everything I love about growing up, a part of me will always try to hold onto what I can of the past.
So it's 2011, January 6 - Christmas Eve.  My cousins, Danylo and Anton, are in Calgary, where they work and go to school.  My Aunt Natalie and Uncle Phil are in BC, presumably spending the night 'in' at their home, a log cabin in the mountains.  My cousin Tammy is traveling in India right now, on a school-related matter that dropped an enviable opportunity in her lap.  Her brother, Andrei, is in Ottawa right now with my Uncle Yaro.  In the morning Andrei will be flying out to an unpronounceable town on the north shore of Baffin Island, where he will be starting a 2-year work contract.  I wonder what will have changed by the next time I see him - I'll miss him.  We've grown quite close.  Dad, on whom we rely to sing carols and pour wine, is in Singapore on business (another enviable opportunity).  We've been left with a small crowd, my brothers, my husband, my Mother and me.  As sad as it makes me to see what was once a massive feast in a crowded house dwindle to such a small group with a modest meal, I'll take it.  One of these years the family will start growing again, and then I'll work on the tradition again.  I'd love for my children to some day have their own fond memories of large, noisy, messy, trying-but-worth-it family holidays.