#25: Fairy Lights
They’re just so pretty, aren’t they? Twinkling away in the darkness in their bright little furry dots of colour. I could sit here for hours, curled up in a blanket and watching the lights.
I like light. Although how many people don’t? It’s energising, like the morning sun shining through Eleanor’s skylight, or the light that allows us to see through a kaleidoscope. The light of day dawning in the morning always provides some pretty spectacular views, as it lights up the world.
Yet I have a soft spot for that cliché light in the darkness. It takes away the potential for strange things moving in the dark, provides a focus for your eyes, and also for hope, and from hope, comfort. In times like these, we need hope.
The world seems a scary place at the moment. Then again, when does it not? I’m reaching what is referred to as the mid-term slog, that moment when you realise that you’re only half way through term, yet feel like you just need a rest, a holiday, some time to curl up and simply watch some pretty lights. When facing all this sense of despair or turmoil, we need a little hope in our lives, which John Green eloquently spoke about in his latest Vlogbrothers video, finishing not on despair, but hope.
For me, right now, hope is the thought of Christmas. When I get to go home to my sleepy little Suffolk village, see my parents and friends and family. I can curl up with one of my many cats by the fire under a blanket in a living room that is, for that month, graced with a Christmas tree, a holder of more of the pretty little fairy lights. There will be Ally McBeal: A Very Ally Christmas floating in the background from the CD player, while the fire crackles and I think how cosy I am, and simply wish for it to snow outside to perfect the scene.
Christmas, my favourite holiday. A time of hope, warmth, a light in the middle of the darkest time of year.
But we’re not there yet. For now, I have my fairy lights, which I have only now dug up out of the boxes of things I have neglected to unpack since starting university this term. Today has been my first day for a while now that I’ve spent entirely in the house, by myself, working. So I decided to treat myself, to unearth the fairy lights and let a little bit more hope into the world that is my room. I wonder how I could have forgot such a simple, pretty thing as fairy lights, when I know I love them dearly. Once they are all up, my room will be even more the safe haven that it is.
Just under five weeks until the end of term. Until then I have many essays to write, books to read, rehearsals to run, and music to learn. There will be numerous end of term Christmas events, and I still need to begin contemplating the Christmas shopping that will need to be done. But to keep me going through all this, which I do enjoy even if I am wishing for some time to collapse and rest, I have hope. I have fairy lights. And what’s better than the simple pleasures of life?
