pull up a chair

where wisdom gathers, poetry unfolds and divine light is sparked…
December 13, 2006

of gingerbread boys and jam

 

i think it’s the darkness of a december morning that i especially love. darkness on the other side of the panes. a blanket of black. inside, so many little lights. especially on this, the feast of santa lucia, yet another miracle of light here in the passage of deepest darkness. it is especially enchanted here on maple lane because we have our own home-grown lucia, a beauty of a now-16-year-old, golden-haired girl. with the trail of swedish princesses and tomten behind her, she dons the candle-lit wreath and breaks open the darkness with her swanlike promenade, sidewalk to street to sidewalk, icicles some years practically dripping from her nose. she is undeterred by anything. if the calendar reads “13 december,” she is under the wreath, she is walking, white robe flowing. and so, as my little tedd awoke this morn, i exclaimed, “it’s santa lucia day.” ever trying to delight him into eating, i offered bread and jam and cheese; “swedish,” i said, spinning. and without skipping a beat, he darted toward the cookie cutter cupboard and insisted, “cut in gingerbread shapes.” but of course. and so, with the blanket of darkness just beyond the panes, we cut out oat bread into gingerbread boys, and dressed them thickly with raspberry pants and raspberry sweaters. to keep the cold away.

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December 11, 2006

a way of being is born

tuesday’s child is full of grace. and so it is tuesday. and so i begin. labor makes you cranky, birthing labor that is. so maybe that’s why i’ve been so cranky these past few days. i was birthing an idea, a virtual universe, and only now, when the baby is making its way out of me, gestating for months, many many months, will the fog lift, the crankiness melt, the darkness give way to light. like all births, i have no idea what’s coming. no idea how all this might unfold. only i have hope and an idea. i hope that this place becomes a touchstone for a whole circle of us, that we will drop in, pull up a chair, share some thinks, as my beloved friend and dula of this site, sandra sweetpea, so perfectly always puts it. as every conversation worth diving into is one that wends and winds, turning this way and that, this too will be a stew. we might marvel at a new children’s book. we might have to swap recipes for that pumpkin bread on my table. i might share a prayer, or a snippet of poetry. i might tell you the very cool thing i just read about pouring a good stiff drink for your paperwhite bulbs so they won’t grow so floppy, and bang against the glass, up there on the sill. if i stumble into a magical shop where handmade or one-of-a-kind things will delight you, you can bet i’ll let you know where and how to get there. the mighty mississippi of all these tributaries, the force flowing ever onward, will be this: we are looking for everyday grace. i believe that in quietly choosing a way of being, a way of consciously stitching grace and Beauty into the whole cloth of our days, we can sew love where before there was only one moment passing into another. making the moment count, that’s what it’s about here. inhaling, and filling your lungs and your soul with possibility. learning to breathe again. learning to listen to the quiet, blessed tick and the tock of your heart. filling your soul with great light so that, together, we can shoosh away the darkness that tries always to seep in through the cracks, wherever they might be. please, pull up a chair….

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