A higher consciousness

Yesterday, on the way from Bozeman to Burlington, I logged quality time in the Denver and Chicago airports. As such, I am now a little more up to date on women’s winter style. Floopy, long shirts, fur-lined collars, stretchy pants and boots are in (duh).

Today was the shortest day of the year, the winter solstice. Ancient Romans called this Dies Natalis Invicti Solis, ‘the Birthday of the Invincible Sun’.

Last night was also a total lunar eclipse. The last time these two events coincided was 1638. The moon was red during this 2010 eclipse because the only light hitting it was glow from Earth’s sunrises and sunsets.

My solstice celebration consisted of copy-editing a pdf of the upcoming Big Sky Weekly, hanging out with my family in Vermont, and going to the gym. Since stretch pants are now totally chic, I was legit to wear my long underwear to the workout facility. I think I even looked stylish, for once.

Warming up on the exercise bike, I read Shape magazine. According to that fine publication, listening to music can calm you down as much as exercising (relaxing blood vessels up to 26 percent). At the end of my workout, while doing a brief yoga session and listening to Metallica’s Master of Puppets, I entered a moment of higher consciousness. Check out a 1989 live music video of that album’s namesake song, ‘Master of Puppets‘.

Tonight, at home on Bixby Hill Road, the fire is raging in the wood stove. The Stiflers are ale tsuzamen (‘all togther’ as my Papa used to say in Yiddish), and I can’t wait to spend a day outside in the beautiful Green Mountain State.