T’is Christmas Eve’s Eve and I perch my moccasins on the rungs of my kitchen chair.  A bowl of sliced apple is to my right, camembert, raspberry jam, and crackers to my left, steaming lime mint tea at my lips, and the 1951 version of Charles Dicken’s A Christmas Carol flickering on one of the two channels on my tiny, cable-less t.v.  It’s a fluke, of course, on by coincidence just as I sit down for my evening treat.  I dip into the apple bowl, making imminent plans for a hot shower and a book in bed, but I stay where I am.

This version has long been a favourite, but I like it the most tonight as I sit alone in my warmly lit apartment.  My dinner dishes wait politely by the sink as I watch Alastair Sim so expertly portray Ebeneezer’s frenzied “awakening:”

“I don’t know anything, I never did know anything, and now I know that I don’t know, all on a Christmas morning. I must stand on my head, I must stand on my head!”

Scrooge grabs an armchair and plunges his head into the pillow, his legs waving wildly in the air.  I laugh out loud.  I suppose it would be strange to say that this is exactly how I feel right now about life with lupus and about life in general, but I do.  Perhaps, I’ve just been drawn in by some classic, seasonal sentimentality.  Regardless, I want to wish all my readers Happy Holidays (and head stands) over the next week of festivities.  Here’s a video clip of another favourite moment for you (particularly the lines at 2 minutes, 30 seconds), before I shuffle away to finally do those dirty dishes: