Fireworks all year

©MCD

Do you know why we use fireworks, sparkles and bangs to welcome the New Year? It stems from centuries-old traditions that sound and light made evil spirits afraid and were thus used to ward off evil.

We too hope that by filling the final month of the year and the subsequent first of the new one with lights and glitter will help bring luck, fortune, prosperity, health and blessings to our life.

Have you noticed how we light up inside and the world seems happier with all the festive decorations during the Christmas and New Year season?

We don’t need much to be happy and bloom. But we often forget that we are the creators of our well-being and happiness.

So let’s make a resolution this year to keep ourselves as happy as we begin the new months, to spread love just as we wish to receive it, and to keep the hope alive that everything will work out for the best with new adventures lying ahead.

Happy New Year everyone!

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Light up, light up

©Sandra Crook

In daytime, it seemed like a simple street lamp with its metallic surroundings and a white exterior. It was nothing special. At least that was what the majority of passers-by thought.

But one little girl believed differently. She saw in that lamppost a fairy tale. The first time she saw it, she said it reminded her of her father’s bedtime stories.

When night came, the lamp turned on; but in different colours. And when the first snowflake fell, the lamp turned itself into a lit-up snowball encasing Santa’s house.

Magic was there. You just had to want to see it.

 

Also part of Friday Fictioneers

In anticipation

With Christmas just a week away, and the New Year a few days to go, we all seem to have something to be waiting for. (I have something more due to my birthday too next week). The lights in the street and the brightly lit houses, the decorations, the fancy atmosphere…they all emit a feeling that something wonderful is about to happen. So we wait…we wait and anticipate that in that one or two days that we celebrate, we will be recompensed for all the hardship the year has brought.

We wait and expect that suddenly this wonderful time of the year will lighten our mood and brighten our lives. Because in essence we need to believe that things will turn out as brightly as the decorations we load upon our houses. We need the optimism of the season in order to survive.

But we spend almost an entire month, if not more, counting down in anticipation of literally just one day that will pass by quicker than we’ll realise. We wait, sometimes forgetting that life is composed of “nows”, those everyday moments that make up our memories. Those experiences that we share with loved ones, which forge who we are and who we want to become.

It is said that good things are worth waiting for, but also that good things don’t last long. The truth is, we also need to try; to put in the effort so that those good things come along a little bit faster and last a bit longer.

In the end, life is what we make of it. And it is how we chose to see it and experience it.

Light up the dark

As children, we’ve all spent nights when we wanted to sleep with the lights turned on. We feel safer this way. As if the monsters hiding in the closet or under the bed or wherever else they may be won’t be able to reach us. As if the nightmares won’t come if the lights are on.

Growing up, we still try to illuminate our lives in whatever way possible. We open the windows each day, hoping the sunlight will come bursting into every corner of our house. We go to work, preferably in a brightly-lit environment, knowing that when located in such a one, we are more productive and efficient. We fill ourselves with knowledge reading about everything and everyone online. We thrive in our certainty that the more we know, the safer we feel.

And we get depressed when autumn arrives, with the falling leaves, the cloudy skies and the rain. The ballads and mood-killer songs overwhelm our heads, our rhythm slows down, and we find ourselves seeking more daylight. Since the early afternoon when the sunset is followed by the imminent darkening horizon, we are urged to get up and turn on the lights.

Because in the end, that is exactly what we need: some light to drive out the darkness. That is why we light candles whenever and wherever possible. Or why, come Christmas and New Year’s we immerse ourselves in coloured lights and sparkles. Because we want to feel safe and certain that the future that lies ahead has in store for us nothing but hope, optimism and the positivity that is so lacking in our times.