i love hearing the tintinnabulation of little bells; there's just the unmistakeable 'festive' tune to it. in grade four i bested the "top student" when i was chosen to recite for our school Christmas program Edgar Allan Poe's poem "the bells", mostly because i knew the poem already by heart, and i was the only one who could pronounce 'tintinnabulation' without stammering or forgetting the next lines.
three Christmases ago, while riding on the subway, i heard a faint ringing of bells. then "santa" got inside the train. there was a family beside me, who i could tell was arabic because of their speech. the three children, aged 7 to 12 went giddy with excitement. the youngest one, a boy, immediately tugged at santa's sleeve and asked if he's allowed to make a wish even though he's islam. santa said, of course, what do you want? the boy replied "a playstation". santa rubbed his beard, touched the boy in the head and made a 'ho-ho-ho' laugh. he then lightly slapped the father's shoulders and said, "heard that, buddy?" at that very instance, the train reached the next station, the doors opened and santa stepped out, the little bells in his hand tintinnabulating as he walked up the escalator.
update: the grands aren't coming now and that makes me feel very sad, especially for the little one who loves coming here. sad and complicated and rather stupid turn of events. so partner and i are off to niagara, if i could get a confirmation on my hotel reservation. i may post or may not post for saturday. so merry Christmas to everyone.
Merry Christmas to you. I am so sorry your grand kids are not coming...as you said, not just for you, but for them too! I hope you have a good one anyway! and you have me beat on "tintinnabulation" by quite a few years! I learned it in my early 20s....reading Cold Fire, by Dean Kootnz. My mom and I always commented on how his books were pretty basic (but fun...at the time..don't read him now) but yet he'd throw out one "vocab word of the day"....like tintinnabulation. I also learned penultimate from him too. Maybe conflagration. I read Poe when I was a kid...LOVED Casque of Amontillado (SP?) and Telltale Heart (that was Poe, right?) Mom bought me a collection of his works. But maybe I missed out on "The Bells!" Have an awesome holiday! I hope it tintinnabulates with joy! :0)
Fantastic photo and comment. One wonders about all these turn of events. We celebrate with some family tomorrow . . the other one in CA is absent. Sad . . but life goes on. I hope that you enjoy your trip and have a Blessed Christmas, summerfield.
@espyetta - omg, MB! i love love love love the story "The Cask (or Casque) of Amontillado". that was brilliant! i've read other stories with the same topic but EAP's story just held me in awe. not that i like dark stories:-) merry Christmas to you, too. i'm taking my tripod with me as i'm sure there's a lot of photographic opportunities around niagara at night. have a good one.
@karenann - this trip was planned in october and the hotel was booked then, too. when we realized we may not be able to bring the kids, we cancelled the hotel. then the kids got sick and they're not coming so i hassled to get back my booking. so off to a photo op we go. because as you said, life goes on. you have a merry Christmas, karenann. and thank you.
Sorry for the turn of events..... Hope you can enjoy the turn of events in spite of it all! Love the bells -- I even leave some of my out year round - -! Something so magical about them. I'm wishing your a tintinnabulating Christmas season!!
@cscecil - you better believe it! am making the best of it. the lights around the niagara falls are gorgeous and am lugging the old tripod and bundling up and when i come back, i will have a week's worth of photos for my album. well, maybe. my door knob sports that really cool bells on the right and i love when they tintinnabulate everytime the door is opened. you have a wonderful Christmas, my good friend. thank you.
What a fun story! ~ Sorry about the kids, that, well, sucks! I love love love bells! We have a kitten and I love her little bell, and all the kids got bells at school, so I can't tell when she's coming! I hope you have a wonderful Christmas and hopefully the family stuff gets sorted out. ~
pretty bells- sweet story- I know a family in our church who must be separated from their grands this Christmas too; another sad story- but hoping that there were other things that made it a nice holiday for you. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
@olivetreeann - thank you, ann. what i'm afraid of is the children might be wondering why they won't be coming here and they've been told something that is untrue. but things are out of our hands. we hope it would still turn out for the better for the children's sake, but if not, they will know the whole truth when they grow a little older.
December 30th, 2011
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@steeler - thank you, howard. and the same to you and your family.
@bkbinthecity - thank you, brian. hello to melody.
@alia_801 - thank you, alia.
@danig - right back at you, mate. thank you.
@catsmeowb - you're welcome, camille. and thank you, too!
@sarasdadandmom - thank you, terry.
@sanera - thank you, sam. you have a wonderful family Christmas.
for you and your family!!