Leaning into Advent

For a child has been born for us,

    a son given to us;

authority rests upon his shoulders;

    and he is named

Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,

    Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

                                                –Isaiah 9.6

I’m big on gift-giving and, truth be told, gift-receiving.

Gifts are interesting things, saying much about how the giver sees the receiver.

When I think on gifts past from folks, especially my closest family, I notice patterns . . .

My son sees my serious side, giving me challenging books to read, new ideas to consider . . . oh, and every now and then, he sees my desperate need of an update.

My step-son and his wife see my cool side.

My step-daughter sees my peacenik social justice side.

And my mother sees always her child, looking out for my needs.

Which all leaves me to ponder what I see in them as I go shopping through their lists and my own ideas of who they are, what they like, what they dream – for I’ve always thought the best gift has a bit of the dream to it.

One of the best gifts ever came via e-mail today – no grand news of any impending birth . . . no extravagant prize . . . just my step-daughter’s wish list with a bunch of links, with one at the last, simply labeled, "oh, and one more. . ."

I clicked the link, which took me to a Google images page for world peace

World peace . . . my beautiful, wonderful, talented, funny, kind, passionate daughter of my heart wants, wishes, hopes, for world peace for Christmas.

I sit down to type my response to her and there’s a rustling sound of something soft falling.  I wonder what it is and go see . . . on the floor are the palm fronds from this past Palm Sunday’s service.  I hang them to dry for next year’s Ash Wednesday service and they had fallen to the floor.

And I hear the words in my memory . . . blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord . . . and I remember The One who came so inauspiciously . . . The One who received gifts from the wise . . . The One who was himself the Greatest Gift of All . . .

and I am minded of the readings through Advent . . . the harsh-sounding promises of wars and rumors of wars . . . cataclysmic shifts when moon and stars can no longer be relied upon to move in their courses . . . the coming of the Servant foretold whose suffering is larger than the world itself . . .

and for the first time, through the news and realities of . . . beheadings . . . families severed . . . promises broken . . . endless wrangling . . . tanks sent to neighboring lands . . . wars and rumors of wars the best recruitment posters as people everywhere weigh in on escalation as our only solution . . .

for the first time . . . I hear the whisper . . . the promise . . . in the most unlikely places . . . in the most unexpected ways . . . ways like the birth of a single child in a remote village in a far corner of things . . . when things are at their darkest – there does peace come . . . like Carl Sanburg’s proverbial fog . . . small and quiet, on little cat feet . . .

The hailers of the day have it right . . . there are signs . . . and they have it wrong . . . the signs are not of our doom . . . the signs are of our salvation. . . it is not destruction which has the final word but redemption.

My girl wants world peace for Christmas and I am moved to ask why not.  Why not world peace for Christmas?

For unto us a child is born . . . unto us, a Son is given . . . and his name shall be called . . . 

The Prince – of Peace

In a Long Line of Women

As I dressed yesterday, I decided to be celebratory.  After all, it was my birthday.  So I dug through my costume jewelry in search of the ‘good stuff’ – the things I have inherited or been given from the women in my family.

On went the ring from Aunt Lucie which she gave me when I graduated from law school. . . my Grandmother Bertha’s bracelet, which my mother had saved for me when I graduated from college . . . and the pearls my mother gave me when I turned 40 (I think – the particular birthdays fade with time) – a reminder we’d come a long way from the days when my Dad would search for pearls for Mom in his oyster stew . . . leaving behind my other grandmother’s wedding ring (too small for my hands and the chain I used to wear it on broken) and her cameo, a necklace from Lucie and trinkets from friends over the years.

Most of the time I don’t wear much jewelry – maybe some earrings, the cross and ankle bracelet gift from my kids for Mother’s Day – that’s about it.

This birthday I decided festive and bejeweled was the order of the day.

But mostly, as I searched and reminisced, I was minded of the long line of women in which I stand . . . for the gifts of remembering and love they have given me . . . for the contributions they made to their world . . .

Grandmother Bertha a teacher and shaper of little minds made to resign when she married but called back to teach later in life when the men went off to war yet again. . . an old lady by the time I came along, I seldom saw that side of her – the teacher side – but there was one day when she was visiting I remember well.  It was summer and my friends and I were playing in the back yard when a couple of older boys came along and knocked down everything we had been building and making – until, that is, my Grandmother came striding out with her cane which she needed by then to walk and which she shook at the boys as she ordered them to leave us alone – which they did.  These boys didn’t listen to anybody.  But they listened to Bertha.  And my 8-year-old eyes saw her in an entirely new light – the lady so seemingly stern and ladylike in her manners became my heroine and taught me how to stand up for others – it’s not that hard, really – you just do it.

And my adult self knows something else too: whether the boys left or not, Grandmother was brave and doing what was necessary and I loved her for that.

She gave that sense of fair play and what is right to her daughters, my aunt and my mother.  Lucie worked all her adult life as a social worker with young people.  And she took in strays – kids on the run, children of friends having a hard time, young family members in life transitions of our own – we all found a welcoming place in Lucie’s home.

And Mom, who took on those same boys later in life when the bullying had gotten out of hand and she saw I wasn’t up to the job she gave me of fending for myself.  And the bullying stopped.

I come from a long line of formidable women – strong, independent, seekers after justice, believers in the power of change for the better, workers for what needs doing without much fuss.

If I stand for anything, count for anything in this life, it is to them I owe the debt of thanks.

Oh, what a lucky, blessed woman am I.

Drop-In Days

Yesterday was a drop-in day . . . I stayed in pj’s and cooked all day while Kathy came to clean, Johnny to check out the tree . . . Melissa to visit (and check out the tree – she didn’t know that’s why she was here, but there was definitely tree-checking) . . . Eddie to drop off a card and speak of a friend who died . . . Dorothy to call . . . Lauren and Kane to drop off some pictures . . . Priscilla to bring a present of cookies and home-made hot chocolate mix (how cool is that?) . . . Ben to check in on travel plans and gift ideas and let me have speaks with grandson Rowen as father and son did some of their own shopping . . .

In my job, I spend a fair amount of time visiting others, but I confess I love drop-in days the best, when I’m at home busy with whatever I’m doing but not so busy that I can’t just sit with a friend and pass the time and hear the news . . . it’s an early Christmas present, this simply being with others . . . and yesterday was my turn.

10 Things I'd Like to Tell My Kids

1. Time flies faster – faster than words . . . faster than time itself – hold onto all of it, this life, real tight.

2. Don’t run from your own tears.  Revel in them, for they, too, are life.

3. You are loved.  More than you may ever know, you are loved.

4. It all matters.  There is no small stuff.  Every single bit of it matters.

5. You make me laugh – all of you – and that’s a rare gift.

6. I am blessed among women for each and all of you in my life.

7. I am so jealous that I will most likely not know you in your old age – there’s that time thing again.

8. Wisdom is the pay-off for age and I love that each of you love and value the old.

9. The world is a different place because you are in it.  Different and better.  You matter.

10. There really is nothing to be afraid of.

Best Valentine Ever

So I hate Valentine’s Day as an event.  I’m not a card curmudgeon or some sort of purist about St. Valentine.  There’s just too much painful history there lurking in the recesses of my mind whenever February 14 rolls around on the calendar.

This year I took a different tack and sent my family Valentine gifts – something I haven’t done since the kids were kids.  It felt good and right and done in advance, I could and did retire the day from my consciousness.

So it was that yesterday I was vaguely aware of the day as I went about my pastor duties and that was good enough.

At Mark’s funeral, I mentioned the cruel irony of bidding a husband farewell on Valentine’s Day and then spoke about how life is not a Hallmark card.  That was my observance of Valentine’s Day, and that was good enough.

In the evening, I visited with Cindy and Brenda to prepare for Guy’s funeral this afternoon.  We sat at Cindy’s kitchen table and remembered Guy as Kirsten came to sit for a moment on her mother’s lap and left, returning to give her grandmother a green duct-tape purse, which I admired greatly.  Off she went again, only to return some time later with a bright pink duct-tape purse for me, which she then filled with candy from her own white paper bag filled with cards and treats from her school Valentine’s exchange.  I loved that custom when I was in school and was delighted when Kirsten shared with me, with the very special bonus of a new purse.

Coming from West Virginia as I do, I’ve long known duct tape is the solution to the world’s problems.  I’ve made an emergency belt out of duct tape, after all.  But a duct-tape purse?  Now that’s special – for yesterday, it mended a wounded heart.

Life Rhapsody No. 1

At creation . . . or was it before –
does it matter?  – The question
(implied of course, for angels
never speak in the interrogative)
is posed – and time itself –newly
created infant that it was --
gasps at the audacity –

Angel’s They won’t thank you for it.
– their self-awareness;
the knowledge that they
will some day die.
They won’t thank you for it, You know.

God I know.

***

Friend Sarah’s ‘this too shall pass’
wisdom is wisdom indeed,
but when did wisdom ever breed gratitude?
Is it the wisdom that grants us the cheek
to hate our creator?
It is
but we hate God for that too, I think, I fear.

***

I’m an evangelist for sadness.
I do sad really well.
What that says about me,
I do not pretend to know.
But there it is.
Having a bad day?
I’m your gal.

***

Messing with the birds
I throw open the door and
the cacophony outside comes
full stop
I laugh with the glee of the
child uncaught
and shut the door
do a ten count
song resumes
throw open the door again
stops
Repeat and repeat and repeat
again – comfort & joy in playing
hide & seek with the birds –
who knew what great
playmates they are?

***

Tis the season 
all bright and wild, 
if Mary had been 
filled with reason, 
there would have been 
no room for the Child.
–Can’t Remember Who (wrote it)

***

The light in the wrong place
as I try to type the words
from the page
the light is always
in the wrong place
blinding – erasing out
the black on whiteness
of the painful words
why can’t I see them?

***

I find the Christmas poppers
in the trunk along with the
other gifts and baked treats
and am delighted – here is
the thing Mom (elevated
at that awkward never-seen-
in-the-created-world angle
reserved for hospital beds)
and I can share – we will
have a Christmas tomorrow –
it’s a thin thing, I know –
even before, Ben always
insisting that I am the only
one among us who enjoys
the poppers and they – the
rest – only go along to humor
me – but I know better –
humoring me is not something
this family does – and so I
am pleased beyond all
proportion, wondering if Mom
would want a picture in her
paper party hat tomorrow
or if the imagining will be
better – am betting the latter
– that hospital bed angle
really isn’t flattering to anyone

***

It is Christmas Eve
My mother lives
Survivor of wars and
family and cancer –
hers and others –
she will not be undone
by a little thing like
a car accident –
and she and I will spend
our Christmas together
at her bedside
and I will know that
I have received my
gift – no baby to me,
she, but a baby
nevertheless
in the created
scheme

***

Rhapsody

Shopping for Jesus

Yesterday I went with Laura and Priscilla to town.  The occasion?  To buy Christmas gifts for three Angel-Tree children on behalf of the church.  Presents may not buy or even bring happiness, but they are tangible evidence of important things – things like: you are loved; the spirit of Santa is real; you matter; life isn’t always about too little; giving is at least as good as getting; time spent with friends is never wasted; knowing each other is crucial to genuine gifting – it’s hard to pick the right jacket for a wee one you’ve never met; and perhaps most of all, how very, very, blessed I am.

I actually get to help a family bring a small measure of Christmas joy to its children.

I just hope Jesus likes the presents we picked; after all, they’re mostly for him.

Pearls of great price

The kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls;

on finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold all that he had and bought it.

                           --Matthew 13.45-46

I own a double strand necklace
of very fine pearls – with matching
earrings – a gift from my mother,
who decided all on her own
that her daughter should have a fine
gift – a gift of beauty and value –
simply and only because I am
her daughter

My mother spent her time
as well as her money
in searching out
just the right pearls,
the right design for the necklace,
the right price, the right jeweler –
they had to be perfect –
these were not pearls for keeping,
but for giving

When I wear the necklace
and the earrings,
I wear not pearls,
or not pearls alone –
I wear my mother’s love
and a mother’s love
is a costly thing indeed

Time Out

I am back in Virginia, back in the county where I live, back in the village where I work, back in the house I call home.  I had forgotten how lovely it is – not in a general way, but in the specific beholding-with-your-own-eyes-in-the-moment way . . . the mountains covered with trees . . . the forest canopy that shields most of the road home . . . the church grounds . . . the home I’ve decorated and adorned with the trinkets and colors and comfort that are uniquely me – I love them all.

Sundial at Culzean Castle, Scotland

But I also love the very rare – unique in my own life, actually – gift I was given – the ability to spend 7 weeks of my life in Scotland, doing whatever I wanted whenever I wanted, having to be nowhere at any particular time, having to answer to no one about what I would do or not do or when I would do or not do it.

It was, it is, the liberation of the disconnect.

It wouldn’t do for a lifetime, but for a wee while, it was . . . heaven – the essence of the practice of being made easy.

We don’t get time outs very often, if ever, we grown ups.

Being so precious, so rare, perhaps something spectacular should come out of them.

But that’s the thing about just being.  It isn’t about the spectacular.  I’m not sure what it is about, but it’s not about that.

I am back in Virginia.

And the lessons, if any there are, will come.

But for now, I have had my time out and it was glorious.

And that is
enough
more
than

For the Man Who Was So Much More

My friend Stu, Stuart F. Hammel, late of Reading, Pennsylvania, died yesterday morning at 3.52 a.m., lying in his family bed, with his wife Twila holding his hand and whispering reassurance into his ear.

Stu at the Golden Gate bridge -
one of Stu's 'thin places'

What keeps coming to me as I think about such things as life and death and the singularity that was Stu is exactly that . . . Stu was a singular guy.

He was my college professor and debate coach more than 35 years ago.  Naturally, I harken back to those times . . . truly halcyon days in our lives, Stu and Twila and me.

I think on Stu and cast about, trying to define Stu’s place in my own life . . . college was such a foundational time, but it was so very long ago . . . how can I recapture that time?  Those feelings?  The defining beginning of a tapestry that would weave our lives, together and mostly, separately?

This is what I come to: Stuart Frederick Hammel was a man who looked at people and decided about them . . . and what he decided was whether they were worth knowing . . . worth adding to the Stu Hammel ‘collection’.

And for some reason, Stu decided that I was someone worth knowing and worth knowing better.

That’s quite a gift to give someone: the belief that in your eyes, they are worth knowing and over time, worth knowing better.

I hope you have such people in your own life.

For one, I am so very, very, grateful that I had a Stu . . . no, the Stu, in my life, deciding that I am worth being known.

Thank you, dear friend.  May your eternal rest be all that I imagine it can be and so much more.

______________________
Stu's obituary

For more on Thin places (the places where we feel our closest connections to God and the cosmos), check out Iona's web site.

Underpants? For Me????

I am so excited to share this particular Christmas with my grandson Rowen.  He is now 4, the perfect age to grasp the wonder and awe and majesty, to rejoice in the anticipation as much as the event, to relish each surprise as it comes his way.  To see Christmas again through such eyes is a delight and I can hardly wait.

In my family, and I suspect in yours, when it comes to Christmas gifts, some are absolutely inspired and will be remembered for a life time, but most are pretty pedestrian, the giver more appreciated than the gift.

And as soon as November rolls around in my family, we stop buying things for ourselves or others unless they’re to be saved for Christmas.  Need a new pair of socks?  Wait for Christmas and maybe Grandma will get you some.  Getting low on dental floss?  There’ll probably be some in your stocking.  And if you’re lucky, there’ll be a can of your favorite black olives all wrapped up under the tree for you.

We wrap everything and call it a gift – I love that about us, even if it does make for some pretty funny gifts (use your own imagination, but think on the advantages of Polident once you’ve reached a certain age).

But my absolute favorite gift moment has to be my son Ben, exclaiming as he opened one such family gift from me, “Underpants?  For me????”

Like Rowen, Ben was still a small boy and there was no irony in his voice.  He was genuinely thrilled to be receiving a gift of white jockey underpants.  Every single gift he opened was a new and wonderful surprise and he received them all, even the underpants, with equal joy.

I love that about him.  I loved it then and I love it still.  This son of mine always finds joy in receiving.  He doesn’t measure and find wanting.  When it comes to gifts, he sees the glass not as half full, but as overflowing.

And isn’t that so very true?

The gifts we receive are gift and giver, all rolled into one . . . what rapture, what joy, that you would think on me . . . that you would give me this . . . from you . . . oh, how lucky, how blessed am I!

Gifting is holy ground and all who stand upon it are blessed.

I don’t know whether Rowen will have his father’s unabashed excitement and gratitude at receiving gifts or not.  I hope so.  I hope I hear from him this Christmas, “Underpants?  For me????” because he is surely going to receive some.

Merry Christmas, Ben.  Be watching for those underpants.

Love, Mom