Cooperative Living November/December 2017 - 4

Viewpoint | by Richard G. Johnstone Jr., Executive Editor
ISSN 1529-4579
RICHARD G. JOHNSTONE JR.
Executive Editor
BILL SHERROD
Editor
LAURA EMERY
Field Editor
JANET BAILEY
Production Manager
LAURIE MILLS,
Apple Eye Studio, LLC
Graphic Designer
AMANDA S. CUNNINGHAM
Advertising Sales
TOMMY CAMPBELL
Design & E-Media Specialist
To contact magazine:
9 a.m.-5 p.m. M-F
Phone: (804) 346-3344
Or at any time:
Fax: (804) 346-3448
Email: bsherrod@vmdaec.com
Web: www.co-opliving.com
Published by the VA, MD & DE Association
of Electric Cooperatives
JAMES E. HUFFMAN
Chairman
HERBERT R. PATRICK
Vice Chairman
FLETCHER B. JONES
Secretary/Treasurer
RICHARD G. JOHNSTONE JR.
President & CEO
Board of Directors: R. Wayne Browning, Belvin Williamson, Jr.,
A&N; C. Michael Sandridge, Michael J. Keyser, BARC; George N.
Goin, Gary E. Wood, Central Virginia; Robert E. Arnold, Michael
I. Wheatley, Choptank; Jeannette S. Everett, Steven A. Harmon,
Community; James E. Huffman, Shawn C. Hildebrand, CraigBotetourt;
Patricia S. Dorey, J. William Andrew, Delaware;
Fletcher B. Jones, John C. Lee, Jr., Mecklenburg; Russell G.
Brown, Greg W. White, Northern Neck; Wade C. House, Stan C.
Feuerberg, Northern Virginia; Dale McNiel, Randell W. Meyers,
Powell Valley; Herbert R. Patrick, Micheal E. Malandro, Prince
George; Linda R. Gray, Kent D. Farmer, Rappahannock; Larry C.
Howdyshell, Michael W. Hastings, Shenandoah Valley; Frank W.
Bacon, Jeffrey S. Edwards, Southside.
Do you hear what we hear? Yes, above the unsettling background buzz
of politicians and pundits in unending news cycles, you'll hear it: the soft,
sweet sounds that reside in the mind's ear, gently yet insistently calling
us home for the holidays.
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PRESSRUN . . . . . . . . . 524,248
COOPERATIVE LIVING (USPS 473-300) is
published 10 times a year, monthly except for
combined March/April and November/ December
issues, by the Va., Md. & Del. Association of Electric
Cooperatives. POSTMASTER, address changes
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ADVERTISING published is accepted on the
premise that the merchandise and services offered
are accurately described and willingly sold to
customers at the advertised price. Neither this
magazine nor the electric cooperatives in Virginia,
Maryland, and Delaware endorses any products or
services advertised herein. If any readers encounter
non-compliance with these standards, they are
asked to inform the Editor.
ights, smells, tastes and touch can all
magically summon memories of people
and places, moments and moods.
But memories can also be stirred and
summoned by sounds: by festive songs, both
sacred and secular ... by hushed tones sharing
holiday secrets and surprises ... by unabashed
exultations as children round corners into
everyday rooms made magical one night a year ...
by emotional reunions, as families and friends
claim again, if only for a day or two,
the closeness denied them for much of the
year by other duties, other places.
Other seasonal sounds take us back: the
steady crackle and startling pop of an
awakening wood fire. The crunch of late
autumn's laggard leaves underfoot. The
amalgam of animated voices, rising and
falling, as family and friends bustle
breathlessly from the chilled darkness
into the warm light of a holiday home.
During this season, magical memories
can also emerge in quiet places. In the
blessed silence outdoors as midnight
approaches, foggy breath filling the night
air, sparkling stars filling the night sky. And
indoors too, in a dark family room, the showy
holiday tree now a shadowy prop, the lively
wood fire now a skeleton of scattered embers,
dying on the hearth, as sleepy children,
exhausted, nod off in the warm darkness, the
day's excitement now a world of dreams.
As the close of 2017 approaches, we extend
a long tradition, and herewith offer a few
selections from much-loved works celebrating
sounds of the season.
S
s
Opening the gate, we tread briskly along the lone
country road, crunching the dry and crisped snow
under our feet, or aroused by the sharp, clear creak
of the wood sled, just starting for the distant
market, from the early farmer's door, where it has
lain the summer long, dreaming amid the chips
and stubble ... .
- Henry David Thoreau,
" A Winter Walk, " 1843.
2
" I knew it before I got out of bed, " she says, turning
away from the window with a purposeful excitement in
her eyes. " The courthouse bell sounded so cold and
clear. And there were no birds singing; they've gone to
warmer country, yes indeed ... . " It's always the same:
a morning arrives in November, and my friend, as
though officially inaugurating the Christmas time of
year that exhilarates her imagination and fuels the
blaze of her heart, announces: " It's fruitcake weather! "
- Truman Capote, " A Christmas Memory, " from
Selected Writings of Truman Capote, 1956.
s
Christmas began when pecans started falling. The
early November rains loosened the nuts from their
outer shells and sent them plopping like machine gun
bullets on the roof of the veranda ... And so you lay
there, listening to the drip drip of rain and plop plop of
nuts, feeling something good is going to happen,
something good and it won't be long now.
- Lillian Smith, " Tree-Shaking Day, " from
Memory of a Large Christmas, 1961-'62.
s
The bobsled would move off, creaking over the frostbrittle
snow ... As the horses settled into a steady trot,
the bells gently chiming in their rhythmical beat, we
would fall half asleep, the hiss of the runners
comforting. As we looked up at the night sky through
half-closed eyelids, the constant bounce and swerve of
the runners would seem to shake the little stars as if
they would fall into our laps.
- Paul Engle, " An Iowa Christmas, "
from Prairie Christmas, 1960.
s
I had scarcely got into bed when a strain of music
seemed to break forth in the air just below the window.
I listened, and found it proceeded from a band ... They
went round the house, playing under the windows ...
The sounds, as they receded, became more soft and
aerial, and seemed to accord with quiet and moonlight.
I listened and listened - they became more and more
tender and remote, and, as they gradually died away,
my head sank upon the pillow and I fell asleep.
- Washington Irving, " Christmas Eve, "
from The Sketch Book, 1819. 
www.co-opliving.com
Sounds of the Season
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Cooperative Living November/December 2017

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Cooperative Living November/December 2017
