Balto and Nikki - Young Love

31. The End of a Journey

Hello, my friends. I hope you are all feeling well.

In December, we give our gifts, wishing well for our world. It is a time when we rejoice and are happy and calm. It is a time to think of your loved ones, both living and dead. A time to forgive and to forget, for a new beginning. The old year 2023 will end soon, and a new year will take its place. Life is everlasting change.

Change was also upon Nikki and me. At the end of our vacation in Vienna, Nikki's father spoke with me about the meaning of a marriage proposal. The reason this even became a topic was that Raphael, the head of our theater group, had proposed to Svetlana. I felt that Nikki was saddened by the fact that I couldn't ask her this question yet. At least, I thought I was unable to do it because of my age. Her father said that I could propose to her at any time, as there are no legal consequences to it. But he advised me to wait for a special moment. After our return home, during a conversation with my mother, she asked me to think about a special location—a place Nikki and I connect with good memories. It took me a while, but with my mother's help, I found it. A place with absolutely zero bad memories. It was time for my girl and me to leave our roles as girlfriend and boyfriend. It was time for us to become more.

We will now go back to Friday, December 15. The last weekend before Christmas. Sunday, the 17th, was the third Advent. 

Snow was falling outside. The house on the opposite side of the street looks as if Santa Claus himself had decorated it in a frenzy of fairy dust. Or dried reindeer dung. Whatever it takes to think that you have to light your house so brightly that the armies of Rohan might mistake it for the beacon of Gondor. I'd love to see this man's electricity bill.

I know that people in the US usually don't celebrate Advent. Some of you, our dear readers, might not have even heard about it. My mother, due to her German roots, loves to celebrate it. It is a tradition her parents taught her. Not that she ever gave much about her parents since the day they left the US, but she still keeps this little ritual going.

Every Sunday ahead of Holy Night, she lights one of the four candles on an advent wreath she made herself from fir branches. Every time she lights a candle, she speaks a part of a little poem that was once written in Germany by Elli Michler in 1923. Mom only translated it into English. Funny, I have been writing this journal for years and always forgot to mention this little tradition. But I guess it isn't that important. This year, I will tell you about it.

On the first Advent, December 3, when the first candle was lit, mom said:

"A candle for peace is what we need because the quarrel will not rest." 

A week later, on the second Advent, December 10, she spoke: 

"For the day full of sadness, a candle for courage."

I will continue with this poem later.

As said, it was on Friday, December 15. I was sitting on my bed with my laptop, working on my journal, when mom entered the room. She had a cup of cocoa in her hands and a smile on her face when she walked towards my bed and said:

"Balto, you shouldn't work here in the dark. It isn't healthy for your eyes."

I gave her a strange look because my room was brighter than during the day, thanks to our neighbor. I replied:

"Mom, this crazy man's Christmas decoration gives enough light for a plane to land."

My mother giggled about my joke.

"I know, but he will have to switch that off soon."

It went dark the same moment she said that. Was my mom secretly a superhero with the power to control electricity? That would be cool, but no.