The rains come again as another rainy Pacific Northwest winter sweeps its way in.
These days, the sky is still dark, and the ground still wet, when I awaken. Most mornings, my wife Carrie has left for her work at the hospital before I awaken around 6 or 6:30, leaving me to my solitary morning ritual of pouring coffee, preparing breakfast, reading the news, and centering myself in the quiet of the Holy Spirit.
I don't know when that part of my morning will end each day. I know how it will end--my daughter Sadie will begin to stir on the monitor, I will give her a few minutes to rub the sleep from her eyes, and I will go and dress her.
For these moments, though, the morning is still dark, the coffee hot, and my internal compass spinning. Christmas last was a madcap of baby colic, a new job, and more. This year, amid the insanity of the politics of the day, seems somehow calmer for me. I know in my bones that this is not so for everyone.
I know it because of what today is--the solstice. It means many things to many different peoples, but in the tradition of the congregations I have served, it has been a time for longest night and Blue Christmas worship services, a time to acknowledge the sadness and loneliness of the holidays, even as slick advertisements and ubiquitous commercials exhort us to be festive (in ways that, naturally, involve spending lots of money that we may or may not have).
I used to need a "happy lamp," a lamp whose light mimicked the sun, to get me through these grey Washington winters, but at least so far, on the shortest day of the year, I haven't had to reach for it yet. I am not sure why. I feel affected by the wet and the night as much this year as I usually do in wintertime, but something has changed. At least one external device I needed I, for the moment, no longer need.
I do not know if that will be so next winter, or the winter after that. Yet for now, it feels good. Maybe I am generating more light myself this year, or maybe I have just learned to survive on less, I'm not sure which. But I think both are good lessons for us during the holiday season--to learn how to make our own light (insofar as we are able), and to learn to live well with less while being bombarded with messages that we need more.
Light and dark are frequent metaphors in Scripture, though in our haste to love the light, I think we can miss the beauty of the dark, and light and dark can take on prejudicial tones that do more harm than good. If it so happens that I am needing less light to get by, I would like to think it is because I have been taught by others over time to understand the true grace of the dark. And if I am indeed generating more light, I hope that it helps illuminate that darkness's grace of which I speak.
For Christianity spends these weeks journeying towards, and awaiting, such grace in Bethlehem, when it comes into the world crying and squalling like my own child, and perhaps like yours as well. Mary births both a child and a future in that nativity, knowing full well that nothing will ever be the same.
What a blessing that continues to be.
My eyes flicker down as I see some stirring on the monitor, followed by those two big hazel eyes blinking awake.
Outside my window, the sun begins its belated cresting over the eastern horizon.
And in more ways than one, a new future begins.
Vancouver, Washington
December 21, 2019