Christmas Eve 2025 Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer by Johnny Marks; Changes by Debra Milligan You’ve heard all about   Dasher and Dancer and Prancer and Vixen,   Comet and Cupid and Donner and Blitzen.   But do you recall   The Most Famous Reindeer   OF ALL . . . Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer,   He had a very shiny nose   And if you ever saw it, You would even say it glows.   All of the other reindeer They used to laugh and call him names   They never let poor Rudy   Join in

Winter Solstice 2025 All I Want for Christmas is You by Troy Powers and Andy Stone Take back the holly and mistletoe   Silver bells on string   If I wrote a letter to Santa Claus   I would ask for just one thing   I don't need sleigh rides in the snow   Don't want a Christmas that's blue   Take back the tinsel, stockings,   and bows —-   'Cause all I want for Christmas is you.   I don't need expensive things   They don't matter to me   All that I want,   It can't be found   U

Mid-December 2025 So much trust had been placed by Guillaume de Vallon in this one Frenchwoman — to be who she’d claimed to be.   Anyone can make an error in judgement.  Guillaume de Vallon certainty did, more than once.  Regarding Yvonne Ferrant, however, the mistake was yet another colossal betrayal of his trust.   When the fullness of this mistake was seen in the full light of day, Yvonne was in the dark with her latest paramour among self-destructive revolutionaries.  Thi

10 December 2025 Decades ago, when I was witnessing illegal, unhealthy, sick and menacing-toward-violent behavior on the parts of certain In-Laws, I made it very clear to them that I wasn’t putting up with any of it.  I didn’t do so within my Family of Origin,  and this band of neurotics wasn’t going to get cut any slack, at least not by me.   I seemed to have been the only one voicing offense and outcry.  Besides, (or maybe because) I was pregnant with Dear Daughter at the t

7 December 2025 It is always a rousingly inspirational experience for me to encounter Chapter 54 of THE DAWN.  I call it The Roosevelt Chapter.   That sense of exhilaration helped me to rather quickly plow through my translation review of Volume II, Book 5, Pour La Victoire, of THE DAWN into L’AUBE.   During the several previous chapters of Book 5, How the Resistance-World Turns, Arthur Boucher Carmichael has returned to France from his U.S. Army mission-post in London.  The

Feast of St. Nicholas 6 December 2025 Domine Deus, Agnus Dei Composed by Antonio Vivaldi Domine Deus, Agnus Dei, Filius Patris,   Domine Deus, Domine Deus   Agnus Dei, Filius Patris   Qui tollis peccata   Domine Deus Rex coelestis   Qui tollis peccata   Domine Filli Unigenite   Qui tollis peccata Domine Deus Domine Deus Agnus Dei Filius Patris   Qui tollis peccata mundi   Miserere   Agnus Dei   Miserere   Filius Patris   Miserere nobis   Miserere Miserere   Miserere nobis.

4 December 2025 Insomnia has its uses.   Last night, I couldn’t get to sleep for about two hours after a late evening viewing of the 1946 Hollywood film noir, The Killers .  Directed by Robert Siodmak, and starring Burt Lancaster, in his film debut; along with Ava Gardner, Edmond O’Brien and Sam Levene, The Killers takes place in Brentwood, New Jersey.   Now, I, a NJ-native/refugee, never heard of Brentwood, New Jersey, but that oddity is of a piece with this movie, based on

4 December 2025 This morning, I opened yet another box of a slasher-sale purchase.  When the ballet flats are 71% on sale, online, how do I pass them up?  They’re lovely, and they fit!  My naked feet are much less naked nowadays.   A second pair from this brand was in order.  (And the company and seller are still making a tidy capitalist profit, even at 71% off of MSRP.)   The box is comical, New York City has always been a circus.  Having elected its first openly Socialist M

December 2025 When You Wish Upon A Star by Leigh Harline and Ned Washington When you wish upon a star Makes no difference who you are Anything your heart desires Will come to you   If your heart is in your dream No request is too extreme When you wish upon a star As dreamers do   Fate is kind She brings to those who love   The sweet fulfillment of their secret longing.   Like a bolt out of the blue Fate steps in and sees you through   When you wish upon a star   Your dreams c

December 2025 Madeline’s Christmas by Ludwig Bemelmans In an old house in Paris That was covered with vines Lived twelve little girls In two straight lines. They left the house at half-past nine In two straight lines, in rain or shine. The smallest one was MADELINE.   She was not afraid of mice She loved winter, snow and ice And to the tiger in the zoo Madeline just said . . .                “POOH POOH!” It was the night before Christmas And all through the house Not a creatu

December 2025 I’ll Never Find Another You by Tom Springfield There’s a new world somewhere   They call the promised land   And I’ll be there someday   If you will hold my hand.   I’ll still need you there beside me   No matter what I do   For I know I’ll never find another you.   There is always someone For each of us, they say   And you’ll be my someone   Forever and a day   I could search the whole world over   Until my life is through   But I know I’ll never find another y

December 2025 Bye Bye Blackbird Music by Ray Henderson, with lyrics by Mort Dixon French translation by Debra Milligan Blackbird, blackbird   Singing the blues all day   Right outside my door    Blackbird, oh blackbird   I gotta be on my way   To wherever there’s sunshine galore.   Pack up all my cares and woes,   Here I go Singing low   Bye bye, blackbird   Where somebody waits for me   Sugar is sweet and so is he   Bye bye, blackbird   No one here   Can love or understand m

30 November 2025   When Faith Faces Evil: The Winged Watchman by Hilda Van Stockum My journey to writing THE DAWN was not linear.  It was a circuitous series of intriguing steps, that led to other steps.  Each one granted me information and insights.  I was largely, if not completely, unaware of those creative dimensions until the summer of 2008 when I set out to compose THE DAWN.   Once I started to write this novel, I was in for a penny, in for a pound.  A very large pound!

30 November 2025 I awoke this morning, refreshed and recharged after a day of exhausting work, mentally, emotionally and physically.   Ah!  The wonders of a long winter’s nap, even when I’m not actually in pittoresque New England, and it’s not officially Winter!   Officially Anything has become a joke.  It’s been a joke for a long time, but no one was allowed to laugh:  The Prudes-In-Charge banned laughter.   It’s time for a little levity, in the midst of our woes.  And the w

24 November 2025 Yesterday, I commented to Dear Husband the lively exchange that comprised my introduction to a young man, an electronics technician for the Associated Press.  It was early summer when I ran into him (quite literally) in a soda shoppe in Washington, D.C.   “I’m a trouble-shooter,” He said.   “I’m a trouble-maker,” I replied.  “Please don’t shoot me.”   In the end, five long years later, I had to shoot him, metaphorically speaking.   “I don’t know if I’ve ever

21 November 2025 I will admit to having to catch up on Current Trends — periodically, regularly, routinely — since I was about twelve years of age.  It’s not been a Lather-Rinse-Repeat cycle, but it can feel that way a lot of the time.   During the summer of 2017, I encountered a hilarious online ad for Adobe software.  The satirically detailed, reality-focused marketing of the Hovering Art Director was perfect.  The acting was superb, the writing fantastic.  This selling-pro

20 November 2025 This morning, I came upon this passage from my translation review of Chapter 56, from THE DAWN into L’AUBE, presented here in the English:   Artur wondered if Camille truly was a widow, and if her widowhood was that small, tidy box which offered security to Camille but which also imposed restraint upon the brilliance of her illumination.  The small, tidy box compelled confinement, one which she initially might have embraced while sensing that circumscription,

16 November 2025 Just in Time Music by Jule Styne, with lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green Just in time, I found you just in time   Before you came my time was running low   I was lost, the losing dice were tossed   My bridges all were crossed   No where to go   Now you’re here, Now I know Just where I’m going   No more doubt or fears I’ve found my way   For love came Just in time You found me Just in time   And changed my lonely life That lucky day.   Now you’re here  

Mid-November 2025 As I Love You by Jay Livingston and Ray Evans; changes by Debra Milligan I will love you as I love you,   All my life.   Every moment spent with you   Makes me more content with you.   Just as you are, you are all I could pray for.   All that you are, that’s what I wake up each day for.   Every single touch and tingle I adore   Every kiss from you to me seems so very new to me Each one warmer than the one before as I love you more and more.   I will love you

November 2025 By The Time I Get to Phoenix by Jimmy Webb; changes by Debra Milligan By the time I get to Phoenix   He’ll be rising   He’ll find the note I left hanging on his door.   He’ll laugh when he reads the part that says   “I’m leaving” Cause I’ve left that man so many times before.   By the time I make Albuquerque   He’ll be working   He’ll probably stop at lunch   And give me a call.   But he’ll just hear that phone keep on ringing Off the wall   That’s all.   By the