Daughter Robin bought our old house when we decided to move. It certainly made things easier…I didn’t have to tidy it up constantly for prospective buyers, and I left packed up boxes everywhere. Then one day in September the movers arrived.
The gate in the garden keeps crashing open and slamming shut. Leaves are blowing up the street at full throttle , and then come swirling back the other way again. The wind is fierce and fickle.
Let there be laughter … no more tears
I’ve cried a river these past few years
Called to Wonder December 2011
Thinking about performance, I came across Marni Kotak. She is a performance artist who tackles questions about the lines between life and art.
Late in October, in an art gallery in Brooklyn, she gave birth.
There are so many examples in nature that remind us that things are never static … change is inevitable .
Advent begins. And together we wait.
Which sounds a bit tedious and pious, and anyways, it doesn’t always feel like waiting, does it? It can feel like the mad dash through an overly-full season ending with the too much of everything experience of Christmas.
But, in church, we try to slow it down a bit. Make Christmas something we can wait for. It makes sense to wait for a birthing story. Usually, that’s how these stories are lived.
Things will get better, I know that’s true
Because I’ve walked the same road as you.
Yesterday was Stir Up Sunday. Also known around Presbyterian circles as goodness-is-Advent-really-next-week-Sunday. But for our Anglican neighbours, it’s about pudding.
More or less.
Up the stairs I lug the fair sized box. It contains my Christmas tree. This year I feel a little more enthusiastic about putting it up. (I know widows that refuse to continue putting up trees, but I’m a traditionalist.)
We climbed a hill on Saturday. It felt good to stretch the legs. There was no great need to climb it, no real goal in doing so. But we had a Saturday morning, and there was a hill nearby. A new friend mentioned recently that she had climbed it with her husband and new baby. She said that the city looked beautiful from the top, so it seemed like a good idea. My kids like to climb hills. And so do I. So we did.
One thing I have learned these past few years is how varied grief is. My experience is similar to many yet I find others who are far more stoic, maybe braver, and not nearly as emotional as I have been.
Will Braun has recently written an opinion piece called Sunday is not a Day for School for Canadian Mennonite. He is a Winnipeg writer and used to work as editor of Geez Magazine. He often writes about faith and culture from a refreshing and sometimes confronting angle.
I have kept a number of emails sent me after Harry died … one from a dear friend who assured me that although time would help, I would probably never get over my grief as my grief was a tribute to a man who loved me for many years.
And perhaps it is true, that the more you love someone the more you grieve.
Blue is building something. It might be the Eiffel Tower. It often is.
We are in the living room together, Beangirl and the Spouse have gone off to school, and we have the day before us. Of course, it’s Halloween – so costume ideas are a bit occupying. At breakfast, Blue was feeling inspired.
I’m going to be a witch. No, I’m going to be Mary. No, I’m going to be a pumpkin. No, I’m going to be a jack-o’-lantern!
Not sure what I did that my son wants to dress up as the mother of our Lord.
But it would be an awfully sweet costume.
I met someone the other day
And saw in her my past
Midway through visitor month chez nous and feeling very blessed with all the people coming through my house. I do like full tables. It’s so hard to have a full table and not do dessert. A few nights ago, it was an apple and walnut cake, slathered in treacle frosting and topped with golden candles for our visiting six year old and for my Blue. My soon-to-be three-year-old Blue.
“Can I do this?” I ask myself. Then making the decision even tougher, I chose the most miserable winter day I could find. It was -20 C and the snowfall at the sides of the roads was in windrows nearly four feet tall. But, I did it!
Morning comes, and bedwarm cuddles for all. Then breakfast and the happy rush of places to go. I take Beangirl off to school and on the way, she runs to catch up with the boy down the street so that they can giggle their way to class together. Blue and his Daddy march off to campus together, where nursery waits with finger-paints, and a library then for the Spouse.
I hadn’t played the family movie for a few years so took courage one day and played it. We looked so young and as I watched I could see our baby girls grow into young adults in front of my eyes.