How To Feel During the Holidays In the Year-That-Must-Not-Be-Named

Our holiday episode features a new Lab Assistant - friend and collaborator Christina Wells Campbell. The first story in the episode is written and read by Silvie Zamora, the second is written and read by Christina, and can be found on her website: www.TentativeEquinox.com. Go there if you're a fan of inspiration and insight. 

Here's her bio:
Christina is a theatre person: mostly actor, sometimes director, sometimes writer. She has a BA in Theatre and English from Simon Fraser University as well as a Diploma in Human Resource Management which she realizes seems like a strange tangent but is definitely related. She is the Artistic Director of Classic Chic Productions which produces classic works of theatre with all or mostly all female-identifying teams. She is also a Performing Arts Programmer at a Civic Arts Centre. She looks forward to being on stage, in the audience, and able to welcome audiences in person again—maybe by the autumnal equinox?

And here's a partial transcript of the episode:

You might think there would be a lot of pressure to put out the perfect end-of-year podcast, that is the perfect blend of a thoughtful review of the year, a humourous look at life’s outtakes, and an upbeat toast to the future. And you would be right. Especially this year.
Luckily, we know Christina Campbell. She IS a perfect blend of thoughtful, humourous, and upbeat, and she has graciously allowed us to include her latest blogpost, and it’s in her own voice. Also luckily, we’re able to look at small things and see big metaphors.
And so, Life Lab Notes presents two holiday pieces.The Shape of a Holiday, by Silvie Zamora; followed by Come Walk With Me, by Christina Campbell.
I’ve been making paper snowflakes.

I’ve found several templates online, in the usual “snowflake” shapes, plus fancier ones that reveal a ring of pine trees, stars, cats, Star Wars characters, and I invented one of a microphone and headphones.

The more ornate the template, the more helpful it is to fold the paper into the layered triangle you need to start with, then lightly draw the lines you’re going to cut along in pencil. But many of the designs involve simple lines, so you can pretty much just follow the template by eye, with your scissors. Even though the lines are strategically placed, you can eyeball it as you cut the required shapes.

The only tricky part about that method, for me, is that I can get mixed up about what part I’m cutting to save and what part I’m cutting away. I hope that makes sense. There’s this tree one I’ve been trying to get just right. Each tree in the circle is supposed to look like a thick outline of a tree, with the centre of it open - cut out. as if you’d drawn a simple outline of a tree with a marker, but you didn’t fill it in. I’ve done several now. The first time, I ended up with the centre part only. I had accidentally cut away the outline, leaving just a very small, chunky tree. Another time I inadvertently cut the part that connects the repeating images, so when I unfolded it, I had six separate trees.

I kept at it, and have finally ended up with a decent looking Christmas tree snowflake, even though I couldn’t make it have all of the boughs. There’s only two. The template has three. But it’s definitely an outline of a tree. The imperfect pattern repeats in a circle and it looks…different, but kind of nice, still.

Can’t visit - won’t visit our family this year, or our friends, so no caroling house to house in a big group. No sitting close, eating, talking, laughing, hugging the people we usually only see once a year. We’ve cut away at all of the things that make up our holiday traditions, and what we’re looking at is not quite right. Not enough boughs. Doesn’t look like the template.
Last year at this time, we sure didn’t know how different this year would be. Weirdly, painfully, worryingly different. 

The traditions just won’t look the same, but we can make sure the important parts are there, the connections between us, even if they don’t end up looking like the template. 

Let this year be different. Let there be merriment in small screens with shaky wifi. Let there be fewer gifts. Let there be smaller feasts. Let there be sadness where there should be, and let there be light.

The Shape of a Holiday was written and read by Silvie Zamora. Come Walk With Me was written and read by Christina Campbell. You can find Christina’s excellent blog, Tentative Equinox, at TentativeEquinox dot com. You can find us at LifeLabNotes dot com, and on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter @LifeLabNotes. Happy Holidays. Hey, happy all the days!