Saturday, December 11, 2010

Christmas in Brooklyn
December Photo Project Day #11

Christmas Concert

Saturday was pretty sweet, start to finish.

After spending a super-productive morning/afternoon on the Upper West Side, I grabbed my passport and headed to Brooklyn, where I met up with the lovely and hilarious and insightful SBG.  We grabbed dinner and then walked to a big old stone church, a few blocks away.

Inside was candle-lit and quiet; we found seats on a wooden pew, surrounded by some of my favorite people. The worship leader at our church, an amazing singer-songwriter, hosts a Christmas concert in this space every year and invites her other amazing singer-songwriter friends to come sing along.  Accompanied by a piano, guitars, drums, a sax, and a mandolin, they offer old seasonal songs with new arrangements.  It's hushed and chilly and reverent and celebratory.  And for the past couple of years, it's been one of my favorite nights in December.

After the concert, there was punch and cookies in the back hall, and after that, SBG and her hubs, B.B. McLanahan, spared me from the subway and gave me a ride all the way back to Manhattan.  Riding in a car?  With funny friends?  While listening to the Bob Dylan Christmas album in its entirety?  Total treat.

As we drove towards the 59th Street Bridge, the lights of the city stretched far and shone brightly to our left.  The Chrysler Building - always glittering - and the Empire State Building - looking classy in all white - plus the smaller lights of the millions of inhabitants.

I thought, "How totally incredible."  How incredibly beautiful, and how incredible that I actually get to live here.  And how incredible is Christmas, that God would live on earth.  And how incredible to celebrate it all, in beautiful spaces with good company and good food and joyful noises.

Pretty sweet.



PS - When I say "Christmas in Brooklyn" do you think of Dominick the Donkey?  Yes?  Good.  Me, too.

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