Wouldn’t it be nice if we had a 13th month in the year? One between December and January. A transition month in which to bring a close to tasks related to the previous year along with time to move into the new year. A month that is not attached to either year. A threshold month.
This past weekend I accomplished one of those threshold tasks. I defrocked the house of its Christmas glow, cleaned, and renewed it for these winter months. Major!
DecemberJanuary
Earlier in the week I re-read my 2023 journals, which is always a beginning of the year ritual. I wrote thank you notes, but have yet to go through the Christmas cards to change addresses, where necessary, and I am sure there are follow-up notes I will want to send after re-reading the letters.
I moved into my new weekly planner and also a new book journal and cleared off my bulletin board, but I haven’t cleaned out any drawers yet, even though my sock drawer is a mess and the kitchen drawers feel cluttered and unorganized. How many jars of outdated spices need to be tossed?
DecemberJanuary
I have had my first 2024 appointment with my spiritual director and have met with some of my directees, but I have not yet prepared the content for all of the January sessions of the writing group I facilitate. I prefer to be prepared at least a month in advance. Oh well.
I’ve made a list of people I would like to see soon, but have not yet made any dates. Nor have I made a necessary dermatology appointment, but I did have my annual physical in December. Check that off the list!
Well, you get the idea, and you probably have your own tasks that signal the end of one year and the beginning of the next.
I understand how rare it is to have complete closure before a new stage begins. The journey is continuous. Even as we grieve the loss of someone or something in our lives, we peek around the corner to an opening, a beginning, a suggestion, an idea, an entry, a new place on the labyrinth.
DecemberJanuary
You may recall that my contemplative companion during Advent and Christmas was one of the Wise Men. (See my December 5, 2023 and December 12, 2023 posts) The Wise Men prompt me to think about the gifts I can bring to the world, but they also remind me about the gift of the journey itself.
Wise one, you who have come far, ...
Do not cease following that star, whose light you have seen at his rising. ...
You will kneel in unfamiliar places, you will uncover gifts.
And you will continue to journey, to search, to look with love-lit vision.
Under that star there will always be home,
always another road, and you will never travel alone. Steve Garnaas-Holmes, www.unfoldinglight.net
And so I continue to move from 2023 to 2024. One step, one task at a time. One day at a time, and I know I do not travel alone.
One More Thought: My Word of the Year
Last year my word of the year was “beloved,” and oh, how that nurtured me, and I hope enabled me to nurture others. For awhile I thought my word for 2024 would be “dwell,” but I now think it is a pair of words.
At the beginning of each new year, I read my journals from the year just past. What were the highlights? The gifts? How well were intentions met or were they discarded? What themes evolved during the year? And what losses were encountered along the way?
At the beginning of 2023, I was trying to shed a lingering cold, not COVID, but a cold that zapped energy and enthusiasm. I was also feeling deeply the loss of a dear friend who had died at the beginning of December. On that first day in January, 2023, I remembered how we entered 2020 totally oblivious to the pandemic about to strike our lives, and I wrote, “What losses will this year bring, for there will be some. How close to my heart will they be? How major will they be in the way I live my life? Or will I be the loss?”
Typically, I’ve entered the new year with energy for new beginnings, new projects, and eagerness to meet new or continued goals, but in recent years I’ve learned to hold expectations more lightly. Perhaps I am learning how to hold life more lightly, too. And more gratefully.
What does this have to do with the photograph of the tree on our boulevard? Well, one morning right after Christmas, I settled into the snug for morning devotions and when daylight appeared I was stunned to see the trunk of this tree and 13 others on our block wrapped in bright green rings. Soon these diseased trees will be removed. The grief has begun.
I think I am grateful, or at least I am trying to be, that we will lose these trees during the bareness of winter. Perhaps the absence of these trees during the non-leafy, non-green months will help us accept the starkness, the lack of branches arching over the street and the sidewalk. I don’t know when the tree removal people will set to work on our block, but I’m trying to use this time to prepare my heart and soul for this loss–as well as other losses, known and unknown, to come.
How do I prepare?
My day begins in stillness, in silence. These winter days it begins in the dark, as I watch the light begin to make its appearance. I whisper my first prayers of the day. “Thank you for the rest of the night. Thank you for the promise of a new day. Thank you for your presence. May I be aware of your presence in all I do and all I am. May my loved ones be aware of your presence. May all who know the losses that life brings know your presence.”
I read the day’s selection from books I have chosen to accompany the year’s pilgrimage. This year I have chosen Daily Readings with Margaret Silf, along with a book I have read before, Fragments of Your Ancient Name, 365 Glimpses of the Divine for Daily Meditation by Joyce Rupp.
A new year and another mile of the journey. Three hundred and sixty-five new chances to watch the sun rise on God’s surprises along the way. Three hundred and sixty-five windows of opportunity through which to glimpse the face of God in the rock face of everyday life.
Margaret Silf, p. 3
Your intimate presence startles my soul…
I ask for the simplest of gifts from you…
The blessing of communicating with you.
Joyce Rupp, January 1
Even as I grieve losses of the past, as well as losses tender and new, and feel the flicker of losses yet to be, the amaryllis in the snug reminds me we are each living and dying at the same time. And we are each beloved.
May this new year bring you many blessings. Happy New Year!
An Invitation
What are you bringing into the new year? I would love to know.
I am always more inclined to read fiction, rather than nonfiction, but oh my, there are memorable books on this list of favorites. I am aware that most of the books I list have not shown up on various media “Best of 2023” lists, and, in fact, many, if not most, of the books were not published in 2023, but this list reflects my personal taste plus the direction of my heart and my interests. I imagine your list is as individual as mine.
I have listed books in the order in which I read them–within the created categories. Browse at your leisure!
Spirituality
Part of my meditation time each morning is to read a book classified as spirituality or theology. All of these books, by the way, are housed in my garret where I write and meet with spiritual directees.
Liturgy of the Ordinary, Sacred Practices in Everyday Life by Tish Harrison Warren
Faith After Doubt, Why Your Beliefs Stopped Working and What To Do About It by Brian D. McLaren
Do I Stay Christian, A Guide for the Doubters, the Disappointed, and the Disillusioned by Brian D. McLaren
A Prayer in the Night, For Those Who Work or Watch or Weep by Tish Harrison Warren
Embers, One Ojibway’s Meditations by Richard Wagamese
Alive Until You’re Dead, Notes on the Home Stretch by Susan Moon
Enchantment, Awakening Wonder in an Anxious Age by Katherine May
Sacred Nature, Restoring our Ancient Bond with the Natural World by Karen Armstrong
Lost and Found, Reflections on Grief, Gratitude and Happiness by Kathryn Schulz
Why Did Jesus , Moses, The Buddha and Mohammed Cross the Road? Christian Identity in a Multi-Faith World by Brian D. McLaren
Things Seen and Unseen, A Year Lived in Faith by Nora Gallagher (Re-read)
Practicing Resurrection, A Memoir of Work, Doubt, Discernment, and Moments of Grace by Nora Gallagher. (Re-read)
Winter Grace, Spirituality and Aging by Kathleen Fischer (Re-read)
The Summer of the Great-Grandmother by Madeleine L’Engle (Re-read)
Wintering, The Power of Rest and Retreat in Difficult Times by Katherine May (Re-read)
Writing
Memoir as Medicine, The Healing Power of Writing Your Messy, Imperfect, Unruly (but Gorgeously Yours) Life Story by Nancy Slonin Aronie
Writing Begins with the Breath, Embodying Your Authentic Voice by Laraine Herring
Other
The Hawk’s Way, Encounters with Fierce Beauty by Sy Montgomery (nature)
A Friend Sails in on a Poem by Molly Peacock
Bomb Shelter, Love, Time, and Other Explosives by Mary Laura Philpott (essays)
Leaving the Pink House by Ladette Randolph (memoir)
The Heartbeat of Wounded Knee, Native America From 1890 to the Present By David Treuer
South to America, A Journey Below the Mason-Dixon to Understand the Soul of a Nation by Imani Perry
One Hundred Saturdays, Stella Levi and the Search for a Lost World by Michael Frank
Catching the Light by Joy Harjo (memoir, poetry)
Fox and I, An Uncommon Friendship by Catherine Raven (memoir, nature)
You Could Make This Place Beautiful, A Memoir by Maggie Smith
An Invitation
What nonfiction books read in 2023 do you recommend? I would love to know.
My Advent companion this year is one of the Wise Men. Each of the other two companions have been my companions in recent years, thanks to the deck of cards, “Advent Perspectives, Companions for the Journey.” (See my December 5 post,https://livingonlifeslabyrinth.com/2023/12/05/advent-1-one-lit-candle/
This particular Wise Man (Woman, please) is having a hard time getting ready for the journey.
I keep thinking about the conversation these three wise people must be having.
Wise Person #1: “There’s this star, and I think we must follow it.”
Wise Person #2: “I’ve seen it, too, and it is so much brighter than all the other stars. That must be a sign.’
Wise Person #3 remains quiet.
#1: “I think we need to leave right away. Tomorrow, in fact.”
#2 “Sounds good to me. Let’s do it.”
#3 remains quiet, but as #1 and #2 get up from the breakfast table, #3 says, “I don’t think I can be ready that quickly. There’s a lot to do before we leave on a trip. And besides, where are we going and how long will we be gone and what about all the meetings and appointments we have–I have–in the coming weeks? Where will we be staying and what do we need to take with us? Are the camels ready for a long journey”
Both #1 and #2 assure #3 that all will be well and somehow everything gets done.
#3 under her breath says, “That’s because I do what needs to be done.” #1 and #2 pretend not to hear her, as they leave the room, and #3 begins creating a master TO DO List.
Cancel mail delivery.
Get out passports.
Hire neighbor to shovel snow.
Do laundry.
Empty refrigerator.
Cancel upcoming appointments.
Pay bills
#3 continues the ongoing dialogue in her head. “Why can’t I be as spontaneous and as trusting as my colleagues? I’ve seen the star, too, and I’ve had the same dreams about the need to follow that star, but I get so bogged down in my routines and wrapped up in my lists. How exhausting that is sometimes!”
#3 takes a deep breath, reminding herself to breathe in the love of God and breathe out her anxieties and fears. Her need to be organized and in control. She closes her eyes, lightly, not tightly, and breathes in and out gently, finding her own rhythm. This is what she must do now, even before getting out the suitcases or making a list of what to take with her on this journey.
Breathe.
Be still.
Open to the Presence.
Trust. Surrender.
See the beauty of that star.
#3 could feel an eagerness arise within her. A yearning to follow, to discover where the star takes us.
And when she opened her eyes, she saw #1 and #2 standing beside her.
#1 said, “We are on this journey together.
#2 said, “Let’s help one another prepare.”
And #3 said, “May it be so.”
I look as far as I can into future days, weeks, months, Desiring to see what is ahead and waiting for me. But my vision is limited and clouded with desire. I return to seeing only what is in this present moment. I do not need to know that which is far beyond. I have only to trust you to direct me, All-Seeing One.... fromFragments of Your Ancient Name, 365 Glimpses of the Divine for Daily Meditation Joyce Rupp
An Invitation
What is getting in the way of your seeing and following the star? I would love to know.
NOTE:
I will publish my list of favorite nonfiction books read in 2023 on my Thursday, December 14 post.
“Rouse us from sleep, that we may be ready to greet the Coming One.”
After these words were spoken, the first candle on the Advent wreath was lit.
Advent has begun.
Not only is our church sanctuary bedecked with stunning new blue paraments…
BUT our home also is awake to this blessed season of the church year.
I always begin the decorating in the kitchen, welcoming the Santas carved by a talented friend. I love the kitchen’s red walls throughout the year, but especially at this time of the year. Yes, I know this is a lot of stuff in a tiny space, but oh, how happy these treasures make me. Somehow I still find room to cook and bake.
Santa watches my every move in the kitchen!
In the dining room the Christmas dishes are on the buffet and the Nativity Scene in its usual place, and this year for the first time the Snow Village is in the bedroom.
The living room is ready for cozy evenings reading or gatherings with family and friends.
But here’s my favorite–a new collection of felt critters and trees. They make me smile every time I pass through the dining room. They may stay in place all winter.
Beginning the Inner Journey
I have always loved creating a setting for an event or holiday. For hospitality, as well as for the daily routines of my life. Unpacking the Christmas bins and arranging our treasures is a form of creativity for me, but it also leads me to the deeper invitations of the season.
After two days of turning mess into pleasant order and a kind of beauty–at least to my eyes, I needed to pause. To rest. To begin the unfolding into what this specific Advent holds for me.
I settled into the snug with my chosen Advent books at hand: Lighted Windows, An Advent Calendar for a World in Waiting by Margaret Silf and Haphazard by Starlight, A Poem a Day from Advent to Epiphany by Janet Morley.
I began the journey by discovering who would be my companion this Advent. I fanned the the deck of cards, “Advent Perspectives, Companions for the Journey,” in my hand and with my eyes closed, my right hand moved slowly over the cards, somehow knowing when to stop. I opened my eyes to meet my companion–one of the Wise Men.
This is not my first year a Wise Man (Woman) has been my companion. In 2020 and 2021 the other two Wise Men led me on the Advent to Epiphany journey. (I must be a slow learner.)
The questions for reflections are the same as for those previous years:
How would you describe the journey you’ve been on this year? What course corrections might be needed now to better lead you in the direction of your Bethlehem?
What precious gifts are you most eager to offer God in this Advent season?
Where in your life might you need to travel a different route in order to avoid danger or harm?
What do you do to follow Jesus?
The reflective questions may be the same for each of the Wise Men, and perhaps some of the answers may be the same or at least similar as in other years, but this is the first time I have taken this journey as a 75 year old woman. I bring this specific self into the journey. I have never lived through 2023 before, and I bring this year’s gifts and losses and joys and learnings into this Advent.
Yesterday morning I read these words in the Margaret Silf book:
So though we are urged to travel light, we must carry our dream with us, wherever the labyrinth of life may lead us. The dream is our energy for the road. It is our memory of those moments when God has unmistakably touched our lives.
p. 30
The journey begins.
An Invitation
What are you experiencing during these early December days? I would love to know.
Thanksgiving weekend, 2013, we moved back to St Paul, the same neighborhood where we bought our first house in 1974, when Bruce graduated from medical school and started his family practice residency, and I was pregnant with our daughter Kate. Now we have two grandchildren, Peter, almost 16 and Maren, 21.
The decision to return to where our family life had begun was not difficult. We yearned to be with our grandchildren more, as well as my aging father. Our life in Madison, WI, was good, very good, but it was time to return home.
Meeting This House
“I can’t do this,” I thought as I stood in the dull and dingy-looking and oh, so small kitchen. “Where’s the refrigerator?” I asked our realtor. Between the two of us we took up all the floor space in this teeny, tiny mini-kitchen. With a big smile she pointed out two refrigerator drawers underneath a counter.
“Isn’t this a clever idea?” She beamed, obviously hoping for a positive reaction from me. “Not having a full-sized refrigerator gives you more counter space,” she added.
I was not enamored.
The cabinets were painted a sickroom white, not the shiny white of nurses’s uniforms of the past, and the countertops were mottled grey and tan, like age spots on ancient hands.
Bruce pointed out the pluses. Excellent condition, good storage, and the price was right, to say nothing of the perfect location–five blocks from where our daughter and her family live, and three blocks from the kids’ elementary school. Yes, location, location, location.
I pointed out what it didn’t have: a fireplace or front porch or central air. All things on our wish list. And that garage, a cramped one-car garage, so small I wondered if I could master the necessary parking maneuvers for my Jeep.
Lectio Divina for a House
Our offer on the house was accepted, and my head agreed with the decision, but my heart was not in agreement. I knew I needed some time with the house. Without my husband. That opportunity came during the house inspection.
Sitting in my car before entering the house, I scanned the block of well-tended homes sheltered by mature trees. My eyes rested on our future home. Not too small, not too big. A pleasant-looking house. I liked the window boxes on the four front windows of the sunroom and the mums on the steps with one small pumpkin obviously placed there by little kid hands. I did not care for the yellow-gold exterior and wondered what color would bring it more to life.
Once inside, I wandered room by room, “reading” the house, gazing with soft eyes, as if encountering a piece of scripture for the first time. Lectio or “reading” is the first step in lectio divina, a spiritual practice that opens the reader to a more intimate relationship with the Word and often leads to clarification, even transformation.
I stood in the narrow, window-lined front room only big enough for a couple comfortable chairs and thought how lovely it would be to sit there and read. I noted the two windows in the kitchen, a gift in such a small space. I paused on the landing going up to the second floor, a refinished attic space and looked out the windows to the backyard. “I could have my office up here and call it ‘the garret.'”
I returned to the front door and took a deep breath, moving into deeper meditation, meditatio, the second step of lectio divina. Could I begin to let go of my space requirements, my vision of what I thought I needed? Could I imagine myself in this space?
There was no room for our large formal couch in the loving room, but how about forming a circle with four comfortable chairs? I began to picture certain loved pieces of furniture in this space. What about placing my lady’s writing desk next to the front door? What a pleasant place to sit and write a letter. My heart softened.
A fountain of ideas began to flow, overflow about ways to modify the house to our taste and lifestyle. A new palette. White wood work and white living room walls. Light beach aqua in the front room, which eventually I called “the snug,” and turquoise in the dining room. Clearly I had engaged with lectio divina’s third step, oratio, or “being active, but it was in the kitchen where I fully embraced that step.
Kitchen Transformation
During our first years of marriage, I cooked and baked and prepared dinner parties in a tiny windowless kitchen where initially I had waged combat with cockroaches. That’s where my Christmas tradition of baking loaf after loaf of cherry walnut bread began. Our kitchen at Sweetwater Farm was small, too, with almost no counter space, but oh, the Thanksgiving feasts created there.
Instead of seeing the space as limited, I reframed it in my mind as efficient. What it needs, I told myself, was crisp marshmallow white cupboards, a white subway tile backsplash and white solid surface countertop. And how about red walls? Santa Claus suit red.
The Fourth Stage: Contemplatio (Resting)
No, I wouldn’t have everything I wanted. A friend suggested we build a front porch. Of course, with enough money and patience and vision, one can do almost anything, but just because we once had something doesn’t means we must have it again. Instead, I rested in contemplation, assured I would discover a new gift.
One day on my morning walk soon after moving in, I noticed a neighbor’s inviting side courtyard, and then I saw other gardens and patios located in narrow side yards, creating private space. Could we do that? We had skinny space on one side of the house leading to the gate into the back yard. Tall arborvitaes lined the boundary between our house and the neighbor’s, leaving space just big enough for a couple chairs and a small table. My husband the gardener enthusiastically approved the plan.
As I settled into our new home, I continued practicing, although unconsciously, lectio divina, opening to its invitation for transformation. Our new secret garden space, which I call “Paris,” symbolized my willingness to let go and discover something new, vibrant, and pleasing; to be transformed.
The Next Decade
We were 65 when we moved into this house, and now we are 75. Our hope and intention is to spend the next decade here as well, but, who knows. Bruce has said he would like to stay in the house on his own, if I died first, but If I were a widow, I would move into an apartment, not wanting to take care of the gardens. In the meantime we live fully, happily, gratefully in this space.
An Invitation
Is there some aspect of your life in which the spiritual practice of lectio divina could be helpful? Something calling for transformation or reframing? I would love to know.
This past weekend my sister and I went to a vintage Christmas market, and I bought this little treasure from years gone by. It’s a nut chopper.
Of course, I don’t need a nut chopper, for I have a food processor and also a smaller electric one that works beautifully for herbs and nuts, and most often I buy walnuts and pecans already chopped anyway. However, when I picked it up I remembered baking cookies when I was a child. I had instant replay images of kitchens in homes where we lived when I was growing up. Now I hasten to add that my mother was not the kind of Mom who enjoyed cooking with her children. I learned to cook and bake by trial and error. Still, this little glass container with its cheery red top, which just happens to match my current kitchen’s decor, inspired homey, happy thoughts.
Memories were clearly on my mind, especially since last week’s theme for the writing group I facilitate was memory. Before reading the writing prompts to the group, I shared some guiding words, quotations about the topic. For example,
There is no explaining this simple truth about life: you will forget much of it. The painful things you were certain you’d never be able to let go? Now you’re not entirely sure when they happened, while the thrilling parts, the heart-stopping joys splintered and scattered and became something else. Memories are then replaced by different joys and sorrows, and unbelivably, those things get knocked aside as well, until one morning you’re picking cherries with your three grown daughters and your husband goes by on the Gator and you are positive that this is all you’ve ever wanted in the world.
Tom Lake by Ann Patchett, p. 116
Remembering events and people from our past lets us claim and share ourselves…We do not merely have these memories; we are these memories…memory is a way of describing the cumulative nature of time, the presence of the past with us. Time not only unravels; it also knits up…memories reveal God’s presence in our life. Memories retrace a sacred journey.
Winter Grace, Spirituality and Aging by Kathleen Fischer, p. 45
The prompts included choosing a decade of your life and writing down as many memories of that decade as you can, or writing about an experience when your memory is contradicted by someone’s version of the same experience or event, or encouraged by Kathleen Fischer’s words, “open the album of your life,” and simply begin writing.
My own response during the 20 minutes of writing time was inspired by what John O’ Donohue says in Eternal Echoes, Exploring Our Yearning to Belong, “Memory is the place where our vanished days secretly gather. Memory rescues experience from total disappearance.”
Lost Memories
A few months before he died, I asked my father what memories he had about Christmas when I was a little girl. My father had an excellent memory, which he nurtured and worked to maintain. For example, when he was in his 90’s he wrote down the names of everyone in his first grade class. Eventually, he remembered each name. He also made a list of everyone who reported to him during his long and successful career.
Here’s the rub: He had no memories of Christmas when I was a little girl. Over the years he had shared his own early Christmas memories, like getting an orange in his stocking and going ice skating on Fountain Lake on Christmas Day, but he was not able to unveil memories about me at Christmastime.
It was clear he was disturbed by this lack of memories, and he quickly said something like “Your mother handled Christmas,” and I’m sure that was true, but really? Nothing about my first Christmas morning or presents I loved or how I reacted to the Christmas tree? Frankly, I was hurt. I changed the subject, wishing I had never brought it up. Later I wondered if bringing some family pictures or sharing my own early memories would have induced a different outcome.
I hasten to add, and I want you to hear this clearly, I have no doubts about how much my father loved me. I have never questioned that, and I treasure my relationship with him, but I am aware that some of the details of my life, stories I would like to know, have disappeared.
When I asked my father to share memories about me as a little girl, I unintentionally opened a place of sadness in him, an emptiness he didn’t know he had. I’m not sure that was a good thing, unless I can use it to learn something about myself and my own memories. What do I most need to remember and even more, what memories about my loved ones do they need and want to know?
Joan Chittister in The Gift of Years, Growing Older Gracefully refers to memories as both burdens and blessings. What I choose to remember and share can be either a burden or a blessing for my loved ones. My hope is that this incident with my beloved father can be remembered as a sacred moment, for as Chittister says, memories, can “tell us what is left to be done. They become a blueprint for tomorrow that show us out of our own experience how to live, how to forget, how to go on again.” And I add, how and what to remember.
Now about that nut chopper. I won’t use it for its intended purpose, but instead I will fill it with red and green Christmas M and M’s, as a glimpse into sweet memories.
An Invitation
When have memories been a burden and when have they been a blessing in your life? I would love to know.
“Reports of my death are greatly exaggerated.” Mark Twain
After Twain’s obituary was mistakenly published, he dispatched these words in a cable from London to the press.
Here’s my story:
When I purchased tickets to the recent National Lutheran Choir’s All Saints concert, I submitted names, as requested, of loved ones who have died in the past year. Those names would be recognized during the concert.
Imagine my surprise, when along with the names of my dear ones, my name—Nancy Agneberg—appeared on the screens in the front of the sanctuary as the choir sang.
Obviously, I was surprised, as was my husband sitting next to me, and friends also in attendance. I was also embarrassed, assuming I had filled in an incorrect space, pressed a wrong key. Whatever! Such an idiot, I told myself.
I am very much alive, but seeing my name listed among those who have died recently gave me pause.
My dear friend Carolyn knowing she would die soon was in the process of planning a party in which all who loved her would gather before she died. Unfortunately, she died before that could happen. However, she also planned her memorial service. When she died on December 1, there was no doubt about her wishes.
Have I planned my memorial service yet? Nope. Oh, I’ve tossed some thoughts–the names of a couple hymns (Beautiful Savior and Morning Has Broken) and a note about scripture I have wrestled with much my adult life (The Martha/Mary story in Luke 10: 38-42), but I have not filled out and submitted the church’s form. What exactly am I waiting for?
This is the week. You are all my witnesses!
One more thought: How easily I chastised myself. How quickly I called myself names. “Idiot.” “Stupid.”
I am not an idiot. I am not stupid. But I made a mistake, an error; one that in the big scheme of things doesn’t matter very much. No one died–not even me–because I goofed. Do I need another layer of self-recrimination added to my all-too human frailties?
Instead, how about this? “Oh, Nancy, remember you are a beloved child of God, and you are loved no matter what.”
An Invitation
Two questions today. 1. Have you prepared your funeral/memorial service? If not, why not? 2. What names do you call yourself? I would love to know. (Whoops–that’s three questions.)
I feel a bit like the last rose of summer. My petals are dropping, the color is beginning to fade, and one hopes the rose bushes in the garden will survive another winter.
How’s that for being dramatic? I remind myself I am an enneagram 4, The Individualist, and we 4s tend to be expressive, self-absorbed, temperamental and yes, dramatic. Sigh!
I am in a sort of sulking mood —also typical of 4s.
I slept well, but don’t feel rested.
I don’t feel like reading. That is never the case for me, so what is going on? Sunday night instead of reading in the evening I watched an old episode of British Baking Show, one I had seen before, of course, and I even remembered who would be named Star Baker that week.
I don’t feel like writing. Not even this blog post. I recently submitted an essay to an online newsletter that has published my essays two previous times, but this time the response was “thanks, but no thanks.” Actually, the editor kindly made suggestions and offered some questions to consider. When I have licked my wounds, I will sit with what she said, but not today.
The week ahead is dotted with some lovely events, including attendance at a concert and a play. Plus, we are taking our grandson to a football game at St Olaf College, our alma mater. (No ulterior motives, of course.) As always, I treasure the weekly time with the church writing group I facilitate and also the scheduled appointments with spiritual direction clients.
The TO DO list for the week is manageable, but I don’t feel like doing any of the tasks. I did throw a load of laundry in the washer, however, so that’s something.
I am not depressed, but I am also not motivated.
I am not focused, but I don’t feel scattered.
I am not bored, but I am not engaged.
I am not discontented, but also not content.
I have always loved this time of the year not just for the beauty of the falling leaves and the crispness of the days, but also as a reminder that cave time is coming. A time that has always felt more spacious and more reflective than the expected busy activity of spring and summer. This year, however, I seem to be approaching the coming months with some anxious wonder. What losses will there be in the coming months? What unknown changes, uncontrollable changes? How will I be confronted with my own aging process?
I am not scared, but I am not in denial.
I am not hungry, but I am yearning.
I am not lost, but I am wandering.
I am not complacent, but I am accepting, and I am willing to accept what I am experiencing and feeling today.
Today more leaves will fall. In fact, as we drove home from church on Sunday we noticed that the ginkgo trees have shed their leaves. They let go all at once.
In Praying Our Goodbyes, Joyce Rupp reminds me:
It is a season to hold the trees close,
to stand with them in our grieving.
It is time to open my inner being
to the misty truths of my own goodbyes.
Autumn comes. It always does.
Goodbye comes. It always does.
The trees struggle with this truth today
and in my deepest being, so do I.
So what am I going to do about this mood I am in? Not much. I am not going to judge myself, berate myself or try to fake a different mood. Instead, I intend to honor this present mood with respect, knowing eventually it will lift. It will lead me out of this corner into a new place.
After all, a new day and a new mood comes. It always does.
An Invitation
What is your Autumn mood? I would love to know.
PS: We woke up to snow, measurable icy, crunchy snow on the ground this Halloween morning. What’s that going to do to everyone’s mood?
Isn’t “sabbath” and “an afternoon at my desk” a contradiction of terms? Am I justifying work done on Sunday by calling it Sabbath time?
Good questions.
God questions.
Questions to explore and ponder.
Sabbath Morning
Sunday morning means church for us. We attend the 8:15 service, and I set the alarm for 6:30. Sunday is the only morning of the week I do that, but I don’t want to rush. I want to enter the sanctuary awake and open.
I want my whole being ready to pay attention, to honor the day and those who have chosen to also be present. My sense of belonging accompanies my desire to welcome.
I bring my concerns and my hopes, my love, my blessings, but also my need to shed my many judgments. Along with my plea for forgiveness for what I have done and what I have left undone, I remind myself of the ways I am called to forgive.
I come knowing I need to empty and make room, but also to fill more fully with a deeper understanding of the person I am created to be.
That is a tall order, but not impossible.
Sabbath time is full of possibilities.
This Sunday was no exception. How good it was to greet and be greeted. How good it was to see a stream of children march up the aisle for the children’s time. How good it was to hear a lovely girl read the lessons. Clearly she had practiced, but at the same time it felt like she was encountering the words for the first time, giving us a gift of freshness and insight.
We do not live to ourselves, and we do not die to ourselves. If we live, we live to the Lord, and if we die, we die to the Lord; so then, whether we live or whether we die, we are the Lord’s.
Romans 14: 7-8
How good it was to hear Pastor Lois’s excellent sermon based on Peter’s question about how many times should we forgive. “Not seven times, but, I tell you, seventy-seven times,” said Jesus.
Stop counting, Nancy, I think to myself.
How good it was to receive the bread and the wine. To share the peace. To sing. To pray. To be together. Sabbath time.
After the service, I hosted the first adult forum of the year. The topic was “Building Community: Holding Each Other Sacredly,” based on a Lakota word, “kiciuzapi.” Because it was the first forum of the new program year, I wanted to set the stage for this part of Sabbath time. A time when we practice community. A time when we become more present to one another and to God’s presence.
What followed was a chance to share stories with one another, for as Wendell Berry said, “Community exists when people know each other’s stories.” Storyteller Gretchen Sage-Martinson gently guided us into the process of telling one another stories.
Laughter.
Tears.
Deep listening.
Warmth and openness.
Sincere questions.
Presence.
Sabbath time.
Sabbath Afternoon
While eating lunch on the patio, I read the NYT Book Review. The day was cool, but not too cool, and I wondered how many days I could sit there without adding an extra later –a sweater or a shawl. I thought about how to spend the rest of the day. I am reading a good mystery (more on that in my Thursday Book Report post) and spending the afternoon in its company would be delightful and restful. Or I could make some zucchini bread using a chunk of the ginormous zucchini a neighbor gave us. I certainly could get a jump on the coming week’s work, but the Sabbath feeling lingered.
What did this day offer? What beckoned me? What whispered Sabbath blessings?
Without a clear answer I walked up the stairs to the garret and sat at my desk. I had a vague notion of cleaning my email’s inbox. Yes, that would be a good thing, but a Sabbath thing?
Without thinking too much about it, I decided to move my laptop from my workspace to my desk in the snug. Just for the afternoon, a Sabbath afternoon of responding to friends’ emails in a chatty, rested, spacious, and loving way. I relaxed into reading blogs I subscribe to, online publications that interest me, and other articles and essays others had sent me because they knew I would appreciate them. I had told myself I would read them when I had the time. Ah, Sabbath time.
And as I wrote, sometimes selecting a card and handwriting a note of love and concern to someone on the prayer list, I paused now and then to watch the sidewalk traffic. The Catholic church up the street held its annual county fair all weekend and families walked by on their way to rides and games and food. The fall day was perfect for the fun. Sabbath fun.
I noted how the trees are entering the new season, a reminder to me of my own movement into this season of my life. Sabbath season.
I moved steadily, mindfully through the overflowing inbox. Now and then I made a note to myself–an idea for a future writing prompt or a resource for my own writing. None of this felt like work. Instead I was in a Sabbath rhythm.
I like what Dan B. Allender says in his book, Sabbath, “Sabbath provides a weekly marker for the contours of life. It is the moment to receive all time and to allow the past and future to congeal, to thicken into ripe, holy fermentation.” pp. 56-57.
That’s just how the day’s unfolding felt.
Sabbath Evening
We met our daughter and grandson for casual supper at our favorite neighborhood bar. Unfortunately, our son-in-love was not feeling well, so didn’t join us. The four of us, however, had a good catch-up. I left feeling like I had experienced a Sabbath Bonus.
Once home I reunited with the mystery I mentioned and read contentedly until bedtime.
A good Sabbath day. A very good Sabbath, indeed.
An Invitation
What does Sabbath mean to you? I would love to know.
Note #1
An essay I wrote, “My View From Here,” has just been published in a lovely online publication, Sage-ing, The Journal of Creative Aging. You can read my essay –and, in fact, the the entire publication at this link.
Living on Life's Labyrinth 