reminder
I've wanted to tell this story for a while now. I have other things I want to get out, but I can't seem to find my voice without telling this, first. So here goes.
Dear readers may recall, in the wake of Sandy Hook I was undone. My crises of faith was already well advanced, anyway; the slaughter of first-graders (not to mention the general ugliness of normal people in the days to follow) was more than enough to push me over the edge.
At the time, the non-profit where I work was in the midst of its holiday art market. On a bright Saturday, a week after the shooting, one of our jewelry-makers was on duty when I came in to do the books. We got to talking - she had recently offered to sell me a necklace that I'd admired, made of lovely greens and purples, my wedding colors. Even with the discount she was willing to give me, it was too expensive for my budget, so I'd declined, but I thanked her and tried my best to make pleasantries, even though my spirits were stuck to the bottom of my boots.
Let me take a moment to describe this artist; a stern-looking, silver-haired Dutch woman with an accent that makes one want to stand up straighter when she speaks. Like a librarian, maybe. Or a head mistress. She is not the easiest person to deal with - and artists, as a whole, are a touchy bunch. She's given me flack about this and that, money things, administrative things. Always something needing an extra ten minutes of my attention. When she works a shift in the gallery I can usually hear her offering a monologue of critical observations about one thing or another. A high maintenance lady.
I don't dislike any of our artists, but I have always, as I say, stood a little straighter when I work with D. Which is what makes what happened this Saturday even more moving.
Somehow, from casual talk of jewelry, we fell on the topic of dead children. The babies in Connecticut, and D's daughter, lost to cancer a few years ago.
I asked D. - I don't know why, can't remember the context, or what made me feel it was even okay to bring up such a thing, just that it was - does it test your faith, to lose a child? To which she replied, "I have no faith."
"I have no faith."
And me, crushed under the despair of it all, nodding. Telling her how, though I do believe, I'm feeling like faith doesn't matter.
And then she says... but. She tells me how she knows, unequivocally, that her daughter exists after death, that she has been around, listened to D., and acted on this world. She tells me of friends, too, who have had these experiences with loved ones that passed. I tell of my brother, like the time his song came on the radio as I drove weeping past his grave. She tells me of a woman scientist she admires, who once said God is not an entity as we understand it, religiously, but rather a force in nature, and I tell her I believe this, too. We talk about art, and shared experiences - how these things are meaningful, and are spiritual. That they are part of what makes life worth living.
And I was reminded, as we hugged, and wiped tears from our eyes (because it had become an emotional thing, a powerful thing - something I can't quite explain but, if you've had a moment like this, you know) smiling and patting each other's shoulders like foolish women, that this force that I understand as god has always given me moments like this, sooner or later. Not always when I need them, not every time, but eventually.
2012 was a hard year. It brought me down further than I've been in a long, long time. But in that moment, an unexpected connection with a hard-to-deal-with colleague, I started to find my soul again.
Oh, and she gave me the necklace. Well, not the exact necklace, because she'd sold it, but one quite like it. I tried to protest, but she said "It's Christmas, and I want you to have it," and with that accent who could refuse.
Side-note: I remembered, later, that this happened on the Solstice. A time of magic. Serendipity. Faith.
The sabbats always seem to work that way, for me.
Dear readers may recall, in the wake of Sandy Hook I was undone. My crises of faith was already well advanced, anyway; the slaughter of first-graders (not to mention the general ugliness of normal people in the days to follow) was more than enough to push me over the edge.
At the time, the non-profit where I work was in the midst of its holiday art market. On a bright Saturday, a week after the shooting, one of our jewelry-makers was on duty when I came in to do the books. We got to talking - she had recently offered to sell me a necklace that I'd admired, made of lovely greens and purples, my wedding colors. Even with the discount she was willing to give me, it was too expensive for my budget, so I'd declined, but I thanked her and tried my best to make pleasantries, even though my spirits were stuck to the bottom of my boots.
Let me take a moment to describe this artist; a stern-looking, silver-haired Dutch woman with an accent that makes one want to stand up straighter when she speaks. Like a librarian, maybe. Or a head mistress. She is not the easiest person to deal with - and artists, as a whole, are a touchy bunch. She's given me flack about this and that, money things, administrative things. Always something needing an extra ten minutes of my attention. When she works a shift in the gallery I can usually hear her offering a monologue of critical observations about one thing or another. A high maintenance lady.
I don't dislike any of our artists, but I have always, as I say, stood a little straighter when I work with D. Which is what makes what happened this Saturday even more moving.
Somehow, from casual talk of jewelry, we fell on the topic of dead children. The babies in Connecticut, and D's daughter, lost to cancer a few years ago.
I asked D. - I don't know why, can't remember the context, or what made me feel it was even okay to bring up such a thing, just that it was - does it test your faith, to lose a child? To which she replied, "I have no faith."
"I have no faith."
And me, crushed under the despair of it all, nodding. Telling her how, though I do believe, I'm feeling like faith doesn't matter.
And then she says... but. She tells me how she knows, unequivocally, that her daughter exists after death, that she has been around, listened to D., and acted on this world. She tells me of friends, too, who have had these experiences with loved ones that passed. I tell of my brother, like the time his song came on the radio as I drove weeping past his grave. She tells me of a woman scientist she admires, who once said God is not an entity as we understand it, religiously, but rather a force in nature, and I tell her I believe this, too. We talk about art, and shared experiences - how these things are meaningful, and are spiritual. That they are part of what makes life worth living.
And I was reminded, as we hugged, and wiped tears from our eyes (because it had become an emotional thing, a powerful thing - something I can't quite explain but, if you've had a moment like this, you know) smiling and patting each other's shoulders like foolish women, that this force that I understand as god has always given me moments like this, sooner or later. Not always when I need them, not every time, but eventually.
2012 was a hard year. It brought me down further than I've been in a long, long time. But in that moment, an unexpected connection with a hard-to-deal-with colleague, I started to find my soul again.
Oh, and she gave me the necklace. Well, not the exact necklace, because she'd sold it, but one quite like it. I tried to protest, but she said "It's Christmas, and I want you to have it," and with that accent who could refuse.
Side-note: I remembered, later, that this happened on the Solstice. A time of magic. Serendipity. Faith.
The sabbats always seem to work that way, for me.