Suddenly, It 's December | Eastern North Carolina Now

    Publisher's note: Please join me in welcoming Author Michele Rhem, who presents us with her poignant memoirs of the Rabbit Patch, where her diaries weave tales of a simpler, expressive life lost to many, but gathered together in her most familiar environs - the Rabbit Patch.

    The spirea has tiny little blossoms, at the rabbit patch. A few of the azaleas do too. The roses are still blooming-and why not? It does feel like April, after all. For the last three days it has been seventy agrees or close to it. Only the trees declare it is autumn.

    Every day , I come home to the rabbit patch and work on the yard til dark. I have already had to clean sections of the territory twice, and I am predicting I will do the same next week. It is an odd affair to clean deep layers of leaves from the Quiet Garden, while pink roses are blooming and the uninvited black-eyed susans, seem to have caught a "second wind". Even the air feels like the time when birds are nesting.

    The unseasonable temperature is quite easy on the "shoe-string" budget at the rabbit patch . . .and I am grateful for that. Still, it does not inspire me to put the Christmas lights on the porch . . .just yet.

    This week is an especially busy time. This is the week of rehearsal for the "Holiday Concert" at our school. There are over three hundred students involved and a million details that come with it. The carpet has not been installed in the farmhouse, where the hole used to be. This means, what used to be in my bedroom, is now in the hall. The leaves are still falling . . .meanwhile, someone else called to tour the house and property. For months, all was well. The house and yard were tidy, but "first one thing happened, and then another" and so the current state of affairs, is that the rabbit patch house is in shambles and the territory is strewn. It will be most difficult to see the charm of the place under such conditions. Still, I do not grow faint of heart, for the rabbit patch still beckons with a most friendly persuasion.

    The moon rises over one field, and the sun sets over another. Nights are quiet and the peace of them wash over you like a tonic. Old trees give shade and younger trees bear fruit and pecans . . Things like roses , jasmine and honeysuckle bloom on the land-like " a love that does cover a multitude of sins". For a country dweller, the rabbit patch is a haven, of sorts. While it is "in the world , it does not seem of it".

    December is upon us, no matter the mild climate. The Farmers Almanac forecast, declares December, a mild and rainy time. I will take Christmas however I can get it. Gingerbread is good, no matter the weather. I will watch old movies such as " Holiday Affair" and "It Happened on Fifth Avenue" . . and I will read "Redbird Christmas" again. I will listen to songs, my grandmother sang and remember how well, my Aunt Agnes played the piano.

    Christmas used to take so very long to arrive. This no longer rings true for me. Now, a season comes along and passes by and I notice none of them are slow. To me, Lyla and I were watching young rabbits not so awfully long ago. . .and October was just yesterday. Maybe it is this way, because of all the details, we inherit as adults. Whatever the case, December is suddenly here and this changes everything.