Lay bare your heart, induce the will of love / to restore what little faith that you may have lost
This is the dark time of the year.
Both in season - it is Winter Solstice, the longest night, the shortest day - and in mental state. The lack of light gets to me. I try really hard to keep my head up, but the relentless lack of sun makes me tired, makes me sad, makes me numb and full of every emotion all at once.
Last night I watched It’s A Wonderful Life. That was a blessing and a curse for someone like me, at this time of year. Like George Bailey, I have tried really hard to support the community around me. Sometimes it is utterly uplifting… occasionally, it is totally heartbreaking, especially when you know that you’re just spooning away at the ocean. But trying is more important to me than standing on the sidelines and not doing anything at all. And the payoff for it all is that I find that I have the best assortment of friends that a girl could ask for, in any lifetime.
That’s what made me cry like a dang baby last night while watching the movie… maybe it’s my hormones, maybe it’s that now that I’m older I truly understand the messages in the movie. Who knows. All I know is that when everyone brings in their savings to help George, I know that moment. I have been the recipient in that moment, and I have helped to facilitate that moment for others. It is the time and space where it hits home the most what it is to have Community, to have people who truly have your back and will help you when you are falling.
My most sincere wish is to be able to give those moments to others who need them most. I get so frustrated by humans, our way of putting blinders on to shield out the parts of the world we are afraid of or don’t agree with or are unable to connect with - but I can’t live without us and our moments of shining compassion, heartfelt humor, and tender connection either. I would rather foster the good moments as much as possible.
We only get one trip on this planet. I want mine to have meant something, somehow, to someone. I want to know that if I had not been here, things would have been worse, not better. And I want to leave here with my heart and head filled with all the amazing moments that reaching out has brought me.
Welcome back, Sun. Please bring me more compassion, more hope, more energy, more love. Please bring those things to us all.
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