Meg Evans

When I woke up, it was quite a dark morning even for midwinter, with wind gusts and the occasional snow shower. Until I checked the time, I wasn’t altogether sure that it was morning at all.

With Christmas Eve being a holiday from work for me, the hour didn’t really matter; but I can’t often fall back to sleep after waking at my usual time, so it seemed not worth trying. After getting my breakfast and coffee, I sat on the couch and changed the image on my art display to a sparkly Christmas tree. Then I switched on a daylight lamp, which took away enough of the gloom to make it look like an ordinary cloudy morning.

I decided to exercise my imagination by visiting my younger selves and their fictional companions in Channelwood village. Although the sky looked brighter there as I pictured it, the trees were still mostly bare, and muddy paths stretched away into a windy woods.

The scene looked more cheerful when I opened the door to the kitchen outbuilding, which is my younger selves’ usual gathering place. They had just finished breakfast, judging by the crumb-strewn plates on the central table, along with one remaining pumpkin muffin on a serving platter (which I nabbed, yum).

Evergreen wreaths with bright red berries adorned the walls. Fragrant candles glowed on shelves and tabletops. Embroidered ornaments hung from the branches of a potted pine sapling in a corner, along with shiny strands of dried grass that served as icicles. A nativity scene with wooden figurines occupied a table beside the tree.

The children’s faces, when I looked closely, were not as festive. Even Sara, known for her unquenchable optimism, couldn’t entirely repress a sigh as she gazed at the merry decorations.

“Sometimes I miss the crowds of London,” she confided. “It’s lovely and peaceful here in this tiny village—but when Christmas is almost here, I want to see the busy shops and bright lights again. Oh, I’m longing to hear the carolers.”

“Yes, I remember,” said Peter, who was sitting cross-legged on a forest-green rug by the tree. “The city lights always looked so jolly when I flew over with the fairies on my way back to Neverland.”

Ella, never idle for long, had started gathering up the breakfast dishes. “I used to dream that someday I would go to the holiday ball and dance with the prince.”

Still sitting at the breakfast table, Queenie sipped from a half-full mug and stared at the little tree as if oblivious to her companions. The silence lengthened until I thought she wasn’t going to join the conversation, but then she spoke.

“I miss store-bought tinsel, sparkling like fresh snow on Christmas morning. And shortbread cookies in a holiday tin. And, and,” her voice quavered as if about to break, “getting together with family.”

Sara nodded, her small face unusually grave.

Although I wanted to say something that would cheer up this somber little group, I wasn’t sure how to go about it. Truth be told, I’d had many of the same feelings myself this year, and whether I had dealt with them any better was debatable. So I stayed quiet, just looking around the room at the holiday decorations, until my glance fell on the nativity scene.

“In my time it’s a lonely year, too,” I said. “But as you know, Baby Jesus had nothing but a manger with the sheep and goats for company. It was enough.”

Sara responded with just a hint of a smile. “Ella carved our nativity scene. She’s a talented artist, though she won’t admit it.”

“It’s nicely done,” I agreed.

“And Peter put the straw on the floor, while Queenie painted the figurines. It all came together very well.”

I turned to say a few words to Queenie, who was just now getting up from the table.

“Next time I visit, I’ll be sure to bring a cookie assortment in a decorated tin.”

The winter’s first snow started falling in my area on Monday. Very little of it stuck to the roads, and I didn’t have to go out anyway because my husband did the grocery shopping. Still, it looked yucky when I took the trash out to the curb, and the lack of sunlight left me feeling a bit gloomy when I brought in the garbage can after Tuesday’s pickup.

I decided to cheer myself up with an imaginary visit to the small village of Channelwood, which I envision as having a pleasant island climate for my younger selves to enjoy. When I arrived, though, it was plainly late autumn even without the snow. The sky was overcast, and the breeze felt chilly. Brown leaves floated in the still water of the pond, not far from where I’d found Peter skimming stones in June.

Looking at the quiet landscape, I didn’t see my younger selves—or, for that matter, much life at all. No birds could be heard in the drab brownish trees, and no ducks or geese swam by in the pond. The only sign of wildlife was a pile of rabbit droppings. I suspected that some mischievous gremlin in my subconscious mind was having a good laugh at my expense.

“It’s so peaceful.”

The soft voice came from my younger self Queenie, who had come up behind me while I was gazing out over the pond.

“I love this time of year,” she continued. “Nature is clearing away the distractions and leaving plenty of space for us to breathe, ramble, and dream. You were daydreaming just now, weren’t you? I saw you jump a little when I spoke. I’m sorry about that—I wasn’t meaning to startle you. What fun things were you imagining?”

Queenie sounded so earnest and hopeful that I didn’t want to disappoint her with the mundane truth of my mental grumbling about rabbit doo and a drab landscape. Sifting through my recent thoughts for something more positive—and falling short—I told her simply, “I was looking for ducks and geese, but didn’t see any.”

“There were ducks here yesterday morning,” Queenie informed me. “I saw them just as the fog was lifting. Don’t you love to go for a walk on a foggy morning? Everything looks so mysterious and magical. Sara told me that when she lived in London, it was easy to imagine fairies around every corner in the fog. Sometimes their silvery wings would come clear, just for an instant, and then they would dart away again after realizing they’d been seen.”

Once again, I couldn’t help but to feel that my imagination left a lot to be desired. Although I’d noticed the low clouds and mist on Monday when I took the garbage out to the street, my focus had been entirely on getting the chore finished before the snowstorm blew in. Visions of fairies or anything else had been very far from my mind.

“I like Sara’s way of looking at things,” I said. “She makes ordinary days seem fascinating.”

“Yes, she does.” Queenie glanced toward the pond again. “Look, there’s a pair of ducks coming toward us.”

“Where I came from, there’s snow on the ground today,” I told her, much more cheerfully. “After I go back, I’ll pretend that I’m living in a cozy gingerbread house with vanilla icing all around it.”

Queenie smiled. “Sara would like that.”

I woke up on a dark, rainy morning and got a cup of Chocolate Glazed Donut coffee from the K-cup carousel on the kitchen counter. That turned out to be an easier decision than choosing an image for my digital art display. I generally pick a different image each morning and try to match it to the ambient light, so that it looks like a window onto a new landscape every day. Usually I match the season, too, unless I’ve had enough of winter and decide that I’d rather see a tropical vacation picture.

Because winter wasn’t here yet, I went with an image of a forest in late autumn—thin, bare trees with only a few red leaves still in place. Something about it left me feeling sad, though; so I changed the picture to a winding stream with autumn trees, some of which still had green leaves.

This one felt like a better match for my mood. I sat on the couch reading a Kindle book for a while. As the day went on, I spent some time reading blogs and thought I probably ought to write something, but wasn’t sure what. I did a load of laundry, played a game on the computer, went back and sat on the couch again, and thought it was a dull and boring day. Even a cold, damp November afternoon had seemed a lot more exciting when I was a kid…

When I glanced up at the art display again, the winding stream image expanded in my imagination to take in a nearby playground. My 12-year-old self was hanging upside down by her knees from the monkey bars, waving to me.

“Hey there, dull and boring grown-up person! Wanna come play on the monkey bars with me?”

That wasn’t quite what I’d had in mind for exciting childhood adventures, to be honest. I pictured myself walking over damp squishy leaves and standing between the monkey bars and the swings, with my feet firmly on the ground as I looked up at her.

“Don’t you think that’s a rude way to talk to your future self?”

Younger-Me, looking entirely unconcerned, swung back and forth a few times before taking hold of a bar and dropping to the ground next to me.

“You sort of called yourself that, didn’t you? And it’s not my fault so much of your imagination went missing when you grew up. That’s what happens to old people—they get so totally stuck in their routines that they can’t do anything if it’s not on their a-gen-da.” She drew out the last word’s syllables mockingly and then, for further illustration, mimed writing on her left hand with an imaginary pen in her right.

“Kids get bored sometimes too,” I pointed out.

“Yeah, but kids don’t stay bored. There’s always something else to do. Or, at least, something to imagine.”

I thought about that for a moment, and then I walked over to the swings and sat down.

“Okay, give me a push.”