You fear the world too much

Tonight is Christmas Eve and the first night of Hanukkah and once again it isn't snowing, though the front walk of my parents' house is slick black ice. From my perspective the season really slewed up out of nowhere this year; I don't know if it was the election or my health, but the latter part of fall just seems to have telescoped itself straight to the solstice. Yesterday derspatchel and I saw the earliest possible matinée of Rogue One (2016) at the Capitol Theatre before heading out to Lexington to help my mother clean the house and decorate the tree; this afternoon everybody ran late, but we made it out in time to wrap the last relevant presents and run last-minute errands and open the door to sairaali, who joined us for dinner (bringing a delicious chicken bisteeya and two kinds of fruit strudel) and the combination holiday. We lit the candles and rolled fudge and put the last ornaments on the tree. I have now a copy of Esther Schor's Emma Lazarus (2006), which I am not burning my way through only because we are observing the family tradition of watching Brian Desmond Hurst's Scrooge (1951) with Alastair Sim, still my definitive version of the story. It's a strange year and I can't imagine what the next will look like. In such times you make an especial effort to hold on to the important things. And eat a stunning amount of chocolate, apparently.

Last night I dreamed of watching a black-and-white film from the 1930's or '40's, though it had a '70's-ish, Michael Caine feel to the memory when I woke up—a man who has taken the fall for his criminal associates swears revenge on them at his trial, gets out of jail and begins to track down their present-day whereabouts only to find that someone is getting to each of them first and killing them before he can get the chance, so he takes it on himself to solve the mystery if only so that he can murder at least one of these double-crossing no-goods himself. I remember winter scenes, studio snow and frozen black sky. He hunched his shoulders into his overcoat like Richard Barthelmess, preemptively defensive. Naturally I woke before I found out how it ended. If it were a Christmas film from the Code era, the protagonist would have a change of heart in the course of his investigations or at least get himself redemptively bumped off by the end; if it were a crime film of the '70's, his quest might still kill him but redemption hasn't got a chance. Rob thinks I should write it myself. I'll have to read even more hard-boiled fiction. Only please be sure always to call it research.

To a softer year, all the same.