"Christmas in the neighborhood," Tim Connor, All rights reserved
Every year I'm more grateful for the human rituals -- the lights & music, the warm rooms, the gifts & the feasting & laughter. I play my part -- do my share to help push back the cold & darkness, which I know are metaphors for despair & for death.
But, as I struggle through shopping & put up the tree, as I gamely ask the near-stranger at the party how he's been, I also accept that I'm in some way separate, outside, one step removed from the festivities. It has always been this way & I'm certainly not complaining. I participate. I do my best to connect & sometimes I succeed.
Yet I'm relieved when the holidays are over.
There's a lyric by songwriter David Grey:
"If life is a living room
then I'm in the hall
and I'm glad..."
4 comments:
A common feeling, I think, particularly among people who make photographs; being in there, but still looking in from the outside, is probably a necessary condition. The disconnection is what allows the picture to be made.
Happy New Year, Tim.
I can so relate to that feeling and in fact I feel it whenever there are "group" activities. I've always felt like an outsider looking in, I'm kind of used to it now. :)
I would always want to be in the hallway doubting
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