Have candy, will travel

 “Are you all packed?”

I wave my hands in the air: part acknowledgement of the question, part indignation about having been asked it.

Of course, I’m not packed.

Packing, as nature and history proscribe, means that I will be pacing around in the eight-square-foot space where my clothes and luggage reside until the wee hours of the morning, as he snores, navigating in the dark with only the flashlight on my phone and a faltering memory of where I last saw the shoe travel bag.

As usual, when I have adequate time to prepare, I find myself shoving coconut flakes and confectioners' sugar into a tote bag a few minutes before we depart for a weekend in Maine.

This is how one finds themselves emptying out the “baking supplies” drawer into a tote bag seconds before hitting the road.

“There are stores near my mom’s,” my husband says with a laugh he has cultivated to isolate the madness of my method.

This trip - part work, part family diligence, part holiday social - was also somewhat impromptu. Once we return, I’ll have only an hour or so to pull a few dozen cookies and a tin of candy out of thin air for a different soirée.

Now as part of not packing my bags during normal packing hours, I had instead decorated a cardboard box to use as a photo booth prop (and tested it with the resident cats).

I also puttered around the kitchen, quickly mixing a new favorite cookie dough that I would roll into logs and store in the fridge. They would be perfectly chilled and ready to slice and bake a mere few minutes before the party.

(I’d been testing them for weeks now, slicing and baking just one or two so as not to overindulge.)

This is when a bell tolled for a message entering the imaginary chat:

“You’re still bringing the potato candies, right?”

And just like that, my feeling of accomplishment at pre-planning a batch of warm cookies disappeared as I realised I had done only enough calculating to know that there wasn’t enough time for the Needhams, for which I’d become known.

He was schlepping the bags of piled next to the door, while I found a package of chocolate chunks and tossed it in with the rest. I contemplated bringing a potato … the secret ingredient … but decided against it, rationalizing there may be an occasion to exploit a near-future dinner’s leftover mashed.

Despite having tasks to tick off, I know there will be time to fill.

As we drive northward, I notice the depth of the snow in the woods, where remnants of it still cling to the trees. I also notice my shovel-tightened muscles have started to loosen.

I smile broadly, imagining how the work of the holidays can also feel effortless, like your mind hurtling itself into a soft snowbank depicted on an old Currier and Ives print.

Make time to enjoy the work and the play.