Christmas Tree, Oh Christmas Tree

Today we took down our Christmas tree...it was one of the best we ever had and we were a happy family under it's branches.

I confess to a touch of melancholy as I threw it over the back fence...

Shortly after, I ran into a lady on our local street.

I stuck out my hand to shake hers, she hugged me. She called me by my name, I faked it with hers.

She was a party in one of my mediations last year, but I couldn't place her. It was a busy year.

You know, I recall it only now as I write this.

It was that sort of mediation where they moved mountains in the space of a day and surprised themselves with an outcome that was as much about the journey as where they ended up.

I remember now...walking slowly home at 10pm, up the steep steps from the city in the rain, knowing why I did this stuff, knowing that for all the knock'em down, drag 'em out mediations I do as a high priced bell hop - taking offers from one room to the next - ones like this made up for all that.

But today I didn't know who she was.

The tree, the lady....am I throwing things out too soon?