In the Spirit of Christmas Yet to Come

The winds last night brought down more dead branches but that seems to be the limit of our local damage. We were lucky, more so than many in southern Minnesota. Today’s snow should provide some traction over any icy spots, if we’re careful enough.

The dogs came through December’s thunder and lightning with limited trauma. Harry the beagle was startled by the lightning and SiSi needed lots of reassurance when it thundered. All in all it could have been worse.

All of the above, and other, makes me wonder how much I take for granted instead of being grateful for how lucky I am. We’re not yet living in a war zone. We don’t feel compelled to risk life and limb to become a refugee seeking a better life. Most of the time the house is reasonably warm and the food is above average. The dogs are great company and the Better Half even better. So far, those in the immediate family and those once removed have remained healthy.

Spirit of Christmas Past or Future?

Photo by J. Harrington

All in all my guardian angel must be working overtime and yet all too often I focus on what’s not right rather than feeling gratitude for what’s going well. The good news is that I’m still working on the mindfulness themes of “acceptance, impermanence, non-clinging (“letting go”), compassion or the unity of all things.” The better news is the work seems to be helping me adjust my attitude -- mood -- perspective to one that makes me happier to be me than I’ve felt for a long while. This is looking like one of the better Christmas presence I’ve ever given myself. If I keep at it long enough and well enough, it can become a gift shared with  those closest to me. If this seems interesting, take a look at The Poetry of Presence and bring more joy into your life this holiday season. And, if you’re in a position to do so, share some of what you have with some of those less fortunate, including human and non-human persons. The late Senator Paul Wellstone really got it right when he noted that “We all do better when we all do better.”

In little more than a week it will be Christmas Eve, a night when the miserly Ebenezer Scrooge was visited by three spirits and finally exclaimed to the Spirit of Christmas Yet to Come:

"Good Spirit," he pursued, as down upon the ground he fell before it: "Your nature intercedes for me, and pities me. Assure me that I yet may change these shadows you have shown me, by an altered life."

The kind hand trembled.^[18]

One of the best presents of all this season is the realization that our futures, like Scrooge’s, are ours to create, not something imposed on us from without, despite misfortune, we can help each other overcome it.

Advent

By Mary Jo Salter

Wind whistling, as it does   

in winter, and I think   

nothing of it until

it snaps a shutter off

her bedroom window, spins   

it over the roof and down

to crash on the deck in back,   

like something out of Oz.

We look up, stunned—then glad

to be safe and have a story,   

characters in a fable   

we only half-believe.

Look, in my surprise

I somehow split a wall,   

the last one in the house

we’re making of gingerbread.   

We’ll have to improvise:   

prop the two halves forward

like an open double door   

and with a tube of icing   

cement them to the floor.

Five days until Christmas,

and the house cannot be closed.   

When she peers into the cold

interior we’ve exposed,   

she half-expects to find   

three magi in the manger,

a mother and her child.   

She half-expects to read   

on tablets of gingerbread

a line or two of Scripture,   

as she has every morning   

inside a dated shutter

on her Advent calendar.   

She takes it from the mantel   

and coaxes one fingertip

under the perforation,   

as if her future hinges

on not tearing off the flap

under which a thumbnail picture   

by Raphael or Giorgione,   

Hans Memling or David

of apses, niches, archways,   

cradles a smaller scene   

of a mother and her child,

of the lidded jewel-box   

of Mary’s downcast eyes.   

Flee into Egypt, cries

the angel of the Lord   

to Joseph in a dream,

for Herod will seek the young 

child to destroy him. While   

she works to tile the roof   

with shingled peppermints,

I wash my sugared hands   

and step out to the deck   

to lug the shutter in,

a page torn from a book   

still blank for the two of us,   

a mother and her child.

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