Signposts and Convergence
You're driving to a place you've never been before. You're pretty sure you know where you're going, but you've gone to Google Maps anyway. You have the directions printed out and sitting on the passenger seat. You've just navigated a complicated intersection, maybe a traffic circle or a detour for construction, and now you're coasting along at a comfortable 55 mph on a two-lane highway.
And then you see it.
The sign. The sign that tells you, yes, in fact, you are going in the right direction, your map is correct, your navigation was successful, keep going this way and you'll get there.
This morning, I went to church, as it is the first Sunday of Advent (more on that in a minute), and then I went to a New Leaf company meeting. In church, the pastor talked about hope. Real hope, that acknowledges pain and suffering and yet still believes something better is possible, as opposed to the kind of false hope that just wants to pretend everything is OK. Then in the meeting, a couple of people voiced the opinion that a good New Leaf show will find hope in the midst of the pain - not ignoring the bad stuff, but not being overcome by it either.
It seems to me that I was lucky enough to be where I was supposed to be twice today. And it's only 2:30.
Advent is quite possibly my favorite season of the liturgical calendar. More so than Christmas itself. I'm not going to launch into a diatribe about commercialized Christmas - a lot of it has been already been said, though no one seems to be able to stop the juggernaut of the retail industry - but I think that the experience Christmas (for those of us who celebrate it as a religious holiday and are also part of the secular, popular culture) has become diluted simply because we don't have to wait for it anymore. November rolls around, and suddenly it's "The Holidays" and we are supposed to snap in to this joyful, generous, loving mode - and that's kind of absurd, when you think about it. What's the point of talking about the light that shines in the darkness (and the darkness does not overcome it), if we don't take time to acknowledge that YES, there is darkness everywhere.
One thing I learned from my mother is that looking forward to something is part of the enjoyment of the thing itself. (Which is why she doesn't like surprise parties. The danger with this outlook is living so much in the fantasy/anticipation that you are always disappointed by the reality of the thing. But that is definitely a topic for another day.) So today, I am going to decorate my little apartment. I am going to listen to some old Christmas records that I grew up with (thank you,
vaticanplum). I am going to enjoy the fact that Christmas is still 23 days away, and so I still have time to get ready, to take emotional inventory of 2007, to shop (yes, that, too), to wait, and to keep reminding myself that the waiting now is part of the happiness then.
And then you see it.
The sign. The sign that tells you, yes, in fact, you are going in the right direction, your map is correct, your navigation was successful, keep going this way and you'll get there.
This morning, I went to church, as it is the first Sunday of Advent (more on that in a minute), and then I went to a New Leaf company meeting. In church, the pastor talked about hope. Real hope, that acknowledges pain and suffering and yet still believes something better is possible, as opposed to the kind of false hope that just wants to pretend everything is OK. Then in the meeting, a couple of people voiced the opinion that a good New Leaf show will find hope in the midst of the pain - not ignoring the bad stuff, but not being overcome by it either.
It seems to me that I was lucky enough to be where I was supposed to be twice today. And it's only 2:30.
Advent is quite possibly my favorite season of the liturgical calendar. More so than Christmas itself. I'm not going to launch into a diatribe about commercialized Christmas - a lot of it has been already been said, though no one seems to be able to stop the juggernaut of the retail industry - but I think that the experience Christmas (for those of us who celebrate it as a religious holiday and are also part of the secular, popular culture) has become diluted simply because we don't have to wait for it anymore. November rolls around, and suddenly it's "The Holidays" and we are supposed to snap in to this joyful, generous, loving mode - and that's kind of absurd, when you think about it. What's the point of talking about the light that shines in the darkness (and the darkness does not overcome it), if we don't take time to acknowledge that YES, there is darkness everywhere.
One thing I learned from my mother is that looking forward to something is part of the enjoyment of the thing itself. (Which is why she doesn't like surprise parties. The danger with this outlook is living so much in the fantasy/anticipation that you are always disappointed by the reality of the thing. But that is definitely a topic for another day.) So today, I am going to decorate my little apartment. I am going to listen to some old Christmas records that I grew up with (thank you,
vaticanplum). I am going to enjoy the fact that Christmas is still 23 days away, and so I still have time to get ready, to take emotional inventory of 2007, to shop (yes, that, too), to wait, and to keep reminding myself that the waiting now is part of the happiness then.