It's beginning to feel ...

No, not like Christmas; not yet. But it began to feel today as if this Advent might yet reach its end in a lightening of spirits and an end of the stress of always seeming to be catching up. And it's not just that at last I put up the Christmas tree and decorated it, though that accomplishment did please me. A word about this year's tree: it's taller than my recent purchases from the Forestry Commission, and it's a different variety - a Douglas Fir, with incredibly densely-packed branches. This presented its own problems, and used every single decoration that has survived the past 49 years - usually I select what I want to use and leave the rest in the box. So it's all done up, as you might say, like a Christmas tree ...

In other news I've marzipanned the cake and braved the horrors of the supermarket, not once but twice today. The last of the presents I'd ordered arrived; I'd almost given up on them. I shall wrap them tomorrow before I go to create a stable under the altar at church and cover it up again until the appropriate time. (Not doing this on my own; that would be too sad. Got a pal to do it with.)

The thing that cheered me up most today - and goodness did I need cheering up after seeing (not watching) the first session of the new parliament - that one thing was listening to snippets of recordings from the carol service of my grandchildren' school. It's heartening to hear school pupils playing and singing (in four parts) the carols and hymns that are part of our tradition, the favourites I've sung all my adult life, and to realise that, believers or not, they're having the chance to experience the cultural riches that have come to us through the Christian church. You can't ever force faith on anyone, but I know from my own experience what a lasting effect music and the disciplines of creating music in a wonderful setting can have.

That, and an interesting conversation on Twitter about the demands of carol services in church, turned my mind at last towards the concerns of the season. I think I may have to give up watching the News, however ...