Tag Archives: Light

Dec30

Comfort and Joy 🌲

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Comfort and Joy 🌲

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It’s 12:30pm on Christmas day and I’m upstairs bathing my grandson, Boe, enjoying his little boy antics and squeals of glee. I check my watch and call down to whomever will hear “Hey! Don’t forget to put the roast in the oven at 1!” My sons and daughter in law are scurrying about preparing for our 20 plus guests- straightening out the toys, figuring out the logistics of the oven and deciding whether or not to do the veggies on the grill outside. “I need a bigger kitchen!” – my mantra since my first apartment as a new bride. I inherited the tendency to cook for a crowd from my mother who taught me that food is love.  I’m afraid my kitchen lust will only get me in trouble. If you build it they will come!

Oh Lordy.

I am mentally checking off my to do list until the first guests begin to arrive. Caught up in conversation and coat hanging I relinquish control and my sons and daughter in law take over. The last minute preparations are all taken care of. It happens like that every year. Patrick, the kitchen guru, masterminds the veggies outside on the grill while tending to the 18 lb. prime rib in the oven. Rob organizes the gifts for the white elephant game. Breezy and Peter replenish the appetizers and open wine. It’s magical. When it’s time to eat, I have no idea how it all came together.

Along with the gluten free, vegan, dairy free and vegetarian dietary preferences, I prepared an invocation or “prayer” if you will for all types of believers or non believers- Catholic, Jewish, Muslim, Athiest, or just plain hungry for something!

Beloved Lord,

we do greatly thank you

for the abundance

that is ours 

Amen

For a crazy moment I want to freeze time and keep all these people in my house with the Christmas tree all lit up and the table set with the finest china- the gifts under the tree and the love in the room- little Thomas and Boe young and innocent forever- it all brings me such strength, comfort and joy… I believe we have collectively in this room the power to change the world.

A quote that my sons and daughter in law threw around in jest for several days before Christmas was:

With great power comes great responsibility. ~Voltaire

How providential. The abundance is for us to enjoy. Yes. And it is also ours to share. The beauty of it is that it doesn’t take a particular religion (or food preference) to feel the responsibility to be a man or woman for others. We have so much. We have much to give.

I love my family and I don’t want for a minute to take my “wealth” for granted. I could bottle up all this love and keep it for myself. But it’s such a privilege to be able to “pay it forward”.

Maybe a big ass kitchen wouldn’t be a bad idea after all! Just think of all the guests we could seat and feed!

Perhaps we would entertain angels…

Merry Christmas to you and yours.

Feb15

Love is hard work.

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Love is hard work.

Now that Valentine’s Day is over we can get down to the real business of love.

Love is not always flowers and chocolates or a fine dinner over a bottle of wine.  Rather, these are icing on the cake of love.  The real work of love is behind the scenes.  Subtle yet powerful.   Painful and challenging at times.

Love is saying “I’ll be right there” when you have a million other pressing things on your schedule. Love is the two AM feeding when they are infants, the carpooling to 100 soccer games when they are 10, holding them accountable to a curfew when they are  teenagers, and eventually letting go as they kick and scream for their independence. Love is listening and keeping your mouth shut when you think you have earth shattering advice. Love is being strong and letting someone lean on you. Love is hanging on the phone for hours with a friend who just needs to talk. Love is knowing the difference between supporting and enabling.  Love is forgiving others and releasing obligation. Love is forgiving oneself for mistakes made and roads not taken. Love is keeping vigil at the bedside of a dying parent. Love is holding on to hope in a desperate situation. Love is praying for good news. Love is comforting the grieving. Love is walking to the end of ones’ land every evening and waiting for the prodigal son to return home. Love is holding out a light in the darkness.

Love is swallowing your pride when your pride is getting in the way of loving.

Love is hard work.

 

Dec23

Christmas Gifts… Try Trust

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Christmas Gifts… Try Trust

Madeleine and Isabella

These are my two beautiful great nieces at our annual Shaheen family Christmas party.  Can you see the anticipation in their eyes as they wait for one of the grown ups to holler “Time to open presents!”

Do you remember those days?   You know… when Christmas was all done for you and all you had to do was wake up and be surprised?  And you knew that your mom and dad would get you dressed and make sure you had good healthy food to eat.  They protected you and nurtured you and if life rolled out the way it was supposed to and you were very lucky you developed this thing called TRUST.

We trust the mailman to come.  We trust that Nob Hill will have fresh turkeys the day before Christmas.  We trust that a good friend will be there for us.

But sometimes things don’t go the way we plan and our trust wavers.  We worry about our kids having jobs after we’ve paid for the exorbitant cost of their college.  We worry about how long an aging parent will be able to live alone in their own home.  We worry about our health care or whether the plumber is going to overcharge us or if that mole on our back is going to pass inspection with the dermatologist.

As we get older we find more things to not trust and then we become mistrustful.

Try taking a break from worry today.

Try trust.

Rest in the Grace of the World

When despair for the world grows in me and I wake in the night at the least sound in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be, I go and lie down where the wood drake rests in his beauty on the water and the great heron feeds. I come into the peace of wild things who do not tax their lives with forethought of grief. I come into the presence of still water. And I feel above me the day-blind stars waiting with their light. For a time I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

~Wendall Berry