Weeknotes: November 24–28, 2025
Monday, November 24
At Family Chicken, I pick up an order of fried gizzards which stinks up my car during the last delivery of the night. I'm a few days into a new holiday side hustle as a Door Dash driver. Usually, I play a couple gigs to offset holiday expenses, but nothing materialized this year. It doesn't pay much, but I can generate as much work as I need. I’m also witnessing will signings for a friend’s law practice. Work is work, and I’m happy to get it. Everything is expensive right now and I don't want to end the year in the red.
Tuesday, November 25
After class, I buy my little Fraser Fir and balsam wreath from the supermarket. Driving home through light rain, their aroma, sharp and clean, banishes the lingering fug of fried food in my car. After hanging the wreath, I decide to put my outdoor Christmas lights up too. I'm only a few minutes into this task when they suddenly blink out. This is how I learn that Christmas lights have tiny 3 amp fuses inside them. How many lights have I abandoned over the years that might have been easily fixed by a $1.33 pack of mini fuses?
Wednesday, November 26
Silver streaks, infused with pale blue, trace the contours of Andy’s roof. His old Chevy van is still parked out front, hibernating, like the house, in probate. Today is trash day and I watch two squirrels slip past the bins and up the wooden light post in a swirl of auburn. The replacement fuses I bought for the Christmas lights were a bust — in the end, I had to go back to the hardware store and replace the whole string. Threading them through my porch spindles, I come across the robins’ nest from earlier in the year. It's surprisingly sturdy, a perfect bowl of twigs and grass cemented together by spring mud. I move it to a small outdoor table and place a clutch of glass ornaments inside it. I love my house during the holidays. You don't need to be a magician to make magic — a row of colored lights goes a long way.
Thursday, November 27
Mom and I sort through her drawer of special silverware. I’m transported to another age. Ornate handles monogrammed with seldom-heard surnames from our family tree, the daisy-bordered silver from early in my parents' marriage, a spoon my Granddad liberated from Chicago's Edgewater Beach Hotel. I slip the latter into my pocket. Thanksgiving is the usual clatter of sounds and sensations. I mix a round of Old Fashioneds at the side table that once held the family telephone. Out through the sliding door, I join my brother on the patio. It's like a rest area off the busy highway of life. The effervescent snap of stepping from a warm room into a winter night. It’s one of my favorite sensations.
Friday, November 28
I eat oatmeal with Granddad's filched hotel spoon. It adds a bit of ceremony to my breakfast. Today, there are unavoidable errands and shopping to be done, Black Friday be damned. Fortunately, it ends with a meetup at my local brewery. Later, as I'm leaving the bar, a raccoon scuttles around the corner. It sees me, panics, and immediately retreats into oncoming traffic.
"No, no, no, no, no!" I shout into the wind. As the car whooshes past, I see it disappear behind the opposite house, unharmed. I let out a breath and continue my walk home.