The Twelve Months of Christmas (Part II)

Well, it's been quite a journey, but the Twelve Months of Christmas contest has come to an end. For those who'd like the full scoop on what this is, and to see the first six winners, check out the below link:

http://nathanbuck.blogspot.com/2008/08/twelve-months-of-christmas-part-i.html

Below are winners 7 through 12, plus my thoughts on the experience.

xoxo
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JULIE BERMAN! (July)

Julie, aren't you glad that you don't have to respond to these anymore, going, "Um, Nathan, when is it MY turn? I'm waiting!" Now you can be a diva and just hit "delete" for the next five months of these:)

The lowdown on Ms. Punky-licious:
Julie Berman and I met in, of all places, St. Petersburg, Russia. We both attended the Summer Literary Seminar there in June of 2004, where we ended up in the creative writing workshop led by Mary Gaitskill, an author we both admire. (Her story, "Secretary", was adapted into the film starring Maggie Gyllenhaal and James Spader.) Julie and I hit it off right off the bat -- I have fond memories of checking out hot gay Russian men, taking naps at weird hours because we were there during the White Nights and our sleep patterns were totally f*#$ed up, and reading/writing together while talking about her crazy roommate. Julie's from NYC, but moved to Portland a couple years ago to get her Masters at Lewis and Clark. Funny how we met halfway across the globe, and we now live only a 15 minute drive away from one another! Life works out great, sometimes. We'd kept in touch, on and off, during the couple of years between our Russian Extravaganza and her move here, but it's been so pleasant and refreshing for us to groove, naturally, into a deeper, more intimate friendship as we've dealt with families, jobs, breakups, writing, and discussions on if Punky Brewster is dated or still holds up over time. You know, the important stuff. What I admire most about Julie is her loyalty and consistency with her friends; she's such a steadfast soul, and I sometimes picture her as an Amazon Warrior Princess willing to duke it out with a tribesman or Bengal Tiger to protect and nurture those she loves. She is a Warrior of the Pen, too; her words & writing draw me into quirky, delicate, beautiful worlds filled with love and loss and emotional danger. Julie and my mother, Janice, have also become close friends, and we all have become one giant family of dog lovers & and drama likers. Finally, Julie is my personal hero in regards to the dating world -- she is willing to just put herself out there, demand respect and attentiveness, and she ain't afraid of being attracted to men and admitting to it, something I think our Puritan culture makes us push down inside ourselves. You go, girl. You've been my role model as of late!

***Oh, and I've already made your mix CD, Julie. I was writing this morning and thought to myself, "Um, yeah, I don't want to write anymore today....I'm going to make Julie's CD instead!" And it seems fitting, in my New Age, Wiccan ways, that I would shake up the plastic pumpkin right over my keyboard (something I haven't done before), and draw your name, a fellow writer.

Love you all,
Nathan

KARLA CLARK! (August)

Hi everybody. It's good to chat with you again....Karla, I'm glad I chose your name! I know you've had a rough week! I am going to go make your CD right after I send this email. (And you were in my dreams last night, and it was connected to the care package, and to Charlotte Martin, a singer I love.)

Karla and I met under maybe the most powerful and bizarre circumstances. I'd received a call that Dwight, a resident at Our House, was dying, and I raced to the hospital to be with his family, friends, and other loved ones as he left this realm and entered the next. Karla was there, so soothing with her voice, her gentle touch. She and I talked to Dwight together, and we were two of the last ones with him when he passed away, just a couple hours later. I saw her at an Our House function later, and we hugged and reconnected, and we've been close friends ever since. We went, together, to Dwight's parents' wedding anniversary a couple years after Dwight's death, and it felt cracklingly-perfect to sit outside on that picnic bench, with the helium balloon caught above us in the tree, the sunlight just-right-warm on our faces and arms. Karla is beautiful, serious, mysterious, and sometimes like a diamond. Diamonds can be turned into metaphors in so many ways. Thank you for showing me your own strength, Karla, your own ways of pushing through a Darkness. And thank you for learning to appreciate my wicked sense of humor; I think it's finally won you over:) You can dish it back now and then, too -- I love that!

Until next time,
Cordially yours,
C. Nathan Buck

CARLY KENNEDY! (September)

Happy Labor Day, everyone. I'm thinking of you all as we transition from summer to autumn. It's always a bitter-sweet time of year for me. I will miss all the regular sunshine, but I look forward to leaves changing colors; I will miss the long days, but I'm excited about Halloween and hot cocoa and snuggling in blankets; the hustle and bustle of vacations often slows down, but this then allows us to have Recharged Battery Time, which I relish.

There are only three more of you to go after this round, and I hope you're all enjoying your CDs and care packages. (Karla -- yours has been sitting pretty on my desk until we get together next. I promise you'll love it!) I'm having such fun putting these together, and I hope you're having just as much fun not only receiving them but being a part of this cool ritual where you get to learn about cool folks.

Carly Kennedy and I met through Michael Faris, a mutual friend from Corvallis. I'd put out the feelers in early 2006, saying I was looking for a roommate, and the grapevine drew Carly and me together. I can say without a doubt that Carly (in stiff competition with Tara Beckham) is the easiest roommate to get along with on the entire planet. She's full of kindness and attentiveness, creativity and cute penmanship. We shared in unadulterated love of all things Felicity, left one another encouraging notes in the mornings and evenings, kept the house clean, paid all our bills on time, had regular (though by no means structured or scheduled) emotional check-ins, and got to know one another's families a bit. We talked about men. She put up with me playing my music too loud in the mornings while I wrote. She and her friends created funky, abstract art pieces up in the loft. I have a fond memory of Carly coming to visit once Mom got here, and she was sitting in a chair across from us, and the sunlight fell across her skin and face, turning her into an angel. In the end, Carly Kennedy is earthy and ethereal, tough as nails and gentle as a lamb. That's a pretty beautiful combination, and one I respect with every ounce of my being.

Love to you all. Many hugs. I'm always there (and here) with you all in spirit!

Warmest Regards,
Nathan

MARIEKE STEUBEN! (October)

Marieke and I have one of those connections where we met, and our souls just kind of went, "Oh, yay! We found one another again! How cool is this? Let's play in the Life Sandbox together like we have dozens of other times!" We met in graduate school down at OSU in Corvallis, and our friendship has knitted itself, strengthened, over time as we've emailed, shared stolen moments together when we're in the same time, chatted on the phone about treehouses and burled wood and wedding ceremonies and the brisk hills of Scotland. Marieke is just so....herself. No apologizes, but no harsh edges to wrap that truth up. She reminds me of gypsies, of nomads, from tales whispered around bonfires; when you chat with her you can almost just SEE the strength in her veins and skin, even her hair. She travels fearlessly; sews much of her own clothing; eats healthy; takes stunningly beautiful photographs of nature; picked up and moved to Scotland to be with Andy; hikes and wanderlusts like nobody's business; and has that gentle-strong kind of voice that sticks with you, reminding you that there are people out there who aren't afraid to throw their gauntlet down in the name of their personal truth. I love her.

Marieke,...miss you, and am sending you many visitations of spirits....

Love to all. Happy October, Happy Autumn, and Happy Peace.

Hugs,
Nathan

KEVIN MAUSETH! (November)

Congrats, Kevin, you little diva. You deserve it!

Kevin and I met through our mutual friend, Tara Rogers (now Tara Beckham). I'd heard about K-Boi before I started working at Marsh, a corporate insurance agency; Tara worked there at the time, and she helped get me the job when I moved from Corvallis to Portland; she'd often mentioned Kevin, and I even saw him the day of my interview....We became close friends quickly. I was going through a particularly tough bump in the road -- just moving into the NE PDX home, starting the new job, the yucky breakup with Levi -- and Kevin came into my life at just the right time, providing friendship, fresh insights, compassion, and lots of time and energy. I can officially say he was my first new friend I made when I moved here. In lots of ways, Kevin and I are very different -- we sometimes see things through quite different lenses -- but because of our mutual respect we are able to gain some fresh perspectives into ourselves because of these lenses. Plus, we laugh a lot together! He's the king of making homemade pizza, and he knows how to co-host a dinner party like nobody's business -- he and Lisa Levenson just threw a huge gala for Our House, where I work, and raised lots of money for our residents living with HIV/AIDS. Kevin holds a special place in my heart, and once in a while he says or does something that makes me think he knows me better than I give him credit for. I like to keep on my toes! (Except when doing nasty Bikram yoga poses on Sunday mornings when I'd rather be home sleeping.)

One more month to go, folks! Will it be you?!?! Am I open to bribes?!?! Well, only time will tell....

Happy Day of the Dead today. Hope you all had a ghoulishly terrific Halloween!

Love,
Nathan

MARIANNA WILES! (December)

Marianna, I think it's so funny -- and fitting -- that you would win this last go-round, since we were just chatting about the Twelve Months of Christmas contest when we last got together. I smiled and thought, "This is great."

Marianna and I met each other for the first time TWICE.... but didn't realize it right away. When I was working at Marsh, an insurance company, I would sometimes bop over to Pioneer Place, a mall in downtown PDX, on my breaks. Once in a while I'd dream I could actually afford the expensive chocolates in Godiva, and even less often I'd say, "Fuck it", and I'd buy some ridiculously priced chocolate-covered strawberry and eat up every morsel like I'd died and gone to heaven. One time I happened to get a conversation going with the clerk behind the counter. (Yes, I'm that person in line at the grocery store, gas station, you name it, who's kind of annoying because he's always like, "And how are you doing?" -- and holding up the line for everybody else.) I remember walking away from Godiva that day and thinking, "What a lovely young woman; she just exudes charisma and class!" Cut to a couple months later and my first night's training at Write Around Portland, an organization that provides creative writing workshops to marginalized communities in the area. I sit down on the couch next to a stranger, a young woman with dark hair, and our first icebreaker assignment is to have a dialogue with each other without speaking; we had to write back and forth on pieces of paper. So she and I are going along, and all of a sudden it goes something like this:

"Wait, you work at Godiva? Did you happen to have a conversation with a guy from an insurance company a couple months ago?"
"Yes, was that you?!?! I remember you!"
"I remember you too!"
"And now we're partners in this writing exercise, how funny!"
"You're great!"
"No, YOU'RE great!"

Remember, this was all written, no verbal exchanges allowed....until we had to (unexpectedly) read aloud our dialogue to the other Write Around Portland facilitators. Who all laughed delightedly at this serendipitious reunion.

Marianna knows how to embrace life to its fullest, and to learn from it. She's worked at Godiva, at a bakery, as an editor, and now she's in school for book publishing. She's whip-smart and a go-getter, two very fine qualities. I love listening to her stories about her family -- her father is a playwright in Charleston -- and I've enjoyed the safe space that Marianna creates around her. She has a way of making the air & energy around her feel safe, comfortable, and strong, which in this crazy world is so nice to be around. I always walk away from our get-togethers feeling refreshed, and thankful. And Marianna, you make a KILLER chocolate mousse -- seriously, the best I've ever tasted!

***Okay, everyone, I'm sending a follow-up email to this to say "thanks" and to relay my experiences about this contest:)

Hugs,
Over and out (for about five minutes, until I send the next one),
Nathan
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Hi everybody,

Thanks so much for taking part in my Twelve Months of Christmas contest. I wasn't sure what to expect when I started out, and I have to admit there were times when I was like, "This year is one of the craziest of my life! What a time to pick to do this!" But then, of course, I realized that it's one of the best, most precious things to come into my life this year, and has really held the months together like puzzle pieces to the mysteries of 2008. I've always been pleasantly surprised when I've pulled out someone's name, and I've thought, "So cool! What kind of CD am I going to make for them? What kind of care package?" At times, in a weird way, I also felt self-conscious doing this contest; it's hard to explain, and I don't really know what I mean; maybe it's that I felt vulnerable sharing a part of myself -- parts of all of you -- with this posse who gets this monthly email.

I've had a couple people ask me if I'm going to do it again next year. I've decided, alas, that I'm going to take a break. I've definitely considered it, and for those whose names I didn't draw, my mind & heart have paragraphs, whole stories, to say about you, too....But as we move into 2009 my main goal is to focus on finishing my novel and cocoon myself a little more than I have been. I will say this: if I ever do this contest again, those who didn't get their names drawn will automatically get a shot at this again, and all of you who've had the pleasure of being forced to listen to too many female singer-songwriters on CD, well, I'll make sure you get cc-ed so you can read up on those who have gone along on this adventure with you.

It's been so much fun to meet with you in person to do the exchange, or to head to the post office, knowing that you'll open your mailbox and find some weird little creation inside it. I also like that it was randomness & fate that decided who'd get a package, that everyone had an even chance across the board. I love the hugs, the shared words, the thank you's. Really. They're the best part: you all are bursting with love and goodness!

I hope this message finds you all settling in nicely to December and to the holiday season. My thoughts are with you as we transition out of 8-8-8 (a year of transition) into 9-9-9 (a year of spiritual awakening, however you personally may define that). I'm blessed to know each and every one of you.

Much Love,
Nathan