Christmas joys

After 12 days at home, I return to Denver on Jan. 2. Hence, a brief recap of the Christmas season so far:

Above: Kristin, Ben, Mom, Dad, Bethany at the family reunion

- On Dec 30th, we enjoyed a grand time with relatives at our bi-annual Musser get-together. Folks were visiting from out of town (Uncle Ken and Aunt Fran from Boston) and I got to welcome the newest member of our family, Myra Jane Musser, born this August to my cousin Andy and his wife Kelly. That makes 13 great-grandchildren for my grandparents, with 4 more on the way! Our family keeps blossoming. Also, my cousin Nick returned from Japan and the far East, with about 8000 photos (!)

Below: Bethany with Myra Jane, aged 4 months

- My brother Ben's birthday was Dec 28th, and his girlfriend, Kristin, came down from Boston to celebrate with us. They are both so much fun, and I loved their company, playing 'Dicecapades', watching Penn State and the Patriots, shopping, and playing croquet outside on an unseasonably warm December afternoon.

Below: Dad, Bethany, Ben, and Kristin playing Dicecapades

- It's been such a joy to see friends from high school and college after separations of a few months. The loyalty and consistency of my friends buoys me up, and gives me an anchor for these years, when we're all figuring out where and how to stake our lives.

- In other news: I'm starting up a knitting club with the kids at the after-school program in Denver, and the response from folks at home has been most generous! Between Grandma, Aunt Kay, and Ben's girlfriend, I've collected over 30 skeins of yarn in various colors and thicknesses, along with 14 pairs of knitting needles. I hope to acquire more needles in Denver and get the Club started in about two weeks. The kids are so excited! Three third-grade boys rushed up to me the day before coming home, exclaiming, "When are we going to start that sewing thing???"

Below: Third-grade Knitting Enthusiasts

- One more picture, while we're at it! On Dec. 20, my agency in Denver had a splendidly fun Christmas party. Instead of exchanging gifts among ourselves, we pooled our money and hosted a party for the senior citizens who attend our senior lunches and thermal pool trips. We were able to give each of them a beautiful gift basket with fruit, tea, and other goodies. The entertainment at the party was provided by a group of preschoolers and their moms who attend a school-readiness program called 'Estoy Listo!' (I am Ready!). Thanks to the magical touch of Maria Campos, our in-house designer and decorater extraordinaire, all the kids were decked out in elf costumes, down to their little pointy shoes!

To me, the party was a taste of what the world could be like: folks of all different ages, from babes in arms to those in their golden years, from different cultures and homelands, the employed and not, articulate and not, educated and not, all enjoying each other's company and cooking, laughing together at a bunch of junior elves clapping their hands at the wrong times and trying to squirm out of their felt enclosures. Plus, in the middle of a rollicking Feliz Navidad, Santa himself made an appearance! (I should say 'herself,' since Yesenia, our four-month-pregnant janitor, wore the red and white: no extra padding necessary!) To hear the kids' squeals of delight, you would have thought that this is it, mom, come look! what they've been waiting for all their short lives! Santa! Is not some of the charm of Ole Saint Nick that he presents himself as the embodiment of our hopes, coming to make our lives more merrier, less dull, sweeter? Watching the children made me think of the shepherds that first Christmas, bored by watching their sheep for another long night, when behold! a great multitude of angels appeared, giving glory to God and pointing to a wee manger, where Hope lay sleeping under the watching and wondering eye of his mama. I don't think we can live without hope, and I don't really want to try! And what better person to stick our hopes to than the Creator who became humble to share in our tiny joys and sorrows?

May the rest of your Christmas season be blessed and abundant in hope!

Final photo: Bethany and Santa-Yesenia!

When it rains, it pours

And is that rain cleansing, the gentle rain from heaven we await in the Christ child? Or will we drown? Sometimes it's hard to tell.

I'm home now, here in Mechanicsburg, not quite sure what time it is or why everything is so quiet! No hum of traffic, no loud laughter three floors below, only the sound of 'Elf' on TV. Flying is so surreal - you lift up into the sky, and land a few hours later an unthinkable number of miles away, having skimmed over all the countours of a landscape just as quick and smooth as can be.

Every end is a beginning - in every death comes new life, and every hello has an embedded goodbye within it. So as I say goodbye to my housemates, missing them the minute I drag my luggage inside the airport, I anticipate saying hello to my family, and then goodbye to them, and hello to my housemates, and all over again!

But when I return to Denver, there will be one less housemate to say hello to - one of our twelve will not be returning, and the lot of us are broken-hearted and numb. I don't feel at liberty to disclose the details, and besides, they don't change the lopsided sensation we have now, the tragedy of memories fixed in time with no chance for progression.

In Spanish, there's a wonderfully descriptive word, tuerco, that denotes literally someone with one eye, figuratively someone without the proper perspective. And now, after we've been accustomed to living with 12, we will feel tuerco all together for a while (how long?) as not just one person but eleven dynamic relationships are gone, with an unsettling feeling as the result.

Goodbye and hello, coming home and leaving what has become home. Where do I belong now? I think too much time spent in an airport leads to thoughts of life's transitoriness, how often we feel neither here nor there! I need the grounding of the manger, a God in time and space, to give me a little breathing room.

Christmas drawing ever nearer....

Happy third week of Advent! Our three tall tapers on our table are burning brightly, and only one remains to be lit!

Joy is abundant and over-flowing. My housemates and I celebrated our gift exchange on Sunday night, complete with a poem written for each person. I'll include mine later; right now it's at home on my wall. We also filled the house with sweet smells of fresh baked cookies: white chocolate cranberry cookies by Erin, powder puffs by Betsy, and peanut butter cookies by yours truly.

Last night I attended Annunciation grade school's Christmas play, "Christmas in Lone Star Gulch." Endearing, especially the handbell choir and one kindergarten whose voice carried over everyone else's, defiantly singing one, long, note.

And today I saw the Christmas play at the school I've been working at, Swansea elementary. It was wonderful!! "We need a little Christmas (vacation)" was the title, and the kids were splendid.

Tomorrow my housemates and I are going ice skating outdoors, and then having dinner at our directors' place, and Thursday is the Christmas party at work, complete with little kids dressed like elves singing songs!

O come, O come, Emmanuel! May you find us watching in prayer, our hearts filled with joy and wonder.

Incarnational

While waiting for the 24 North bus this morning, I realized my new favorite thing about winter: In wintertime, the invisible is made visible. Like always, I breathe in and out, but surprise! my breath materializes right in front of me. I can see myself living in a way impossible when the temperature is warmer. My misty breath rises up, like incense, like prayers, borne aloft as a testament of life and its steady rythym.

And of course, the invisible is made visible in the babe of Christmas, the incarnation of a God we could not previously see or touch. This Advent I have had often in my mind a lyric: "Marvel now, both heaven and earth, that the Lord chose such a birth." A birth of obscurity, to a young, poor couple in the back eddy of an empire. The familiarity of the Nativity scene can dull my senses to its immensity, and it is a grace to gain fresh wonder at that night in Bethlehem.

I gain fresh wonder from my confirmation class. "God became a baby?" they ask. "You mean, he cried and was little and couldn't talk??" The Incarnation shatters our false icon of a God so removed from our lives as to be pointless, like a distant benefactor who foots our bills reluctantly.

I get fresh wonder from the expectant mothers I know. A few weeks ago, my coworker Yesenia told me she was pregnant, and I had the distinct sensation that a moment ago, I thought I was talking only with Yesenia, but truly there was another present in the room, silent but real, hidden within a woman.

And I get fresh wonder from our prayer room decoration: a large painting of Joseph and very-pregnant Mary, traveling on donkey to Bethlehem. A simple painting, their faces are blank. Could they not be any other young, poor, jubilant and terrified expectant couple? How often do I meet Joseph and Mary, and baby Jesus, hidden right in front of me?

The winter chill makes me recognize my breathing, which is always there but seldom noticed. And when I do, I am more reverent of its continual presence, of my exsistence. Perhaps if mysteries were always concrete, we would become dependant on signs, and our faith would atrophy. So we're given glimpses here and there, at the bus stop, at the manger, and thus are taught to hone our senses to see what lies beneath our daily lives. To see the Incarnation in every face. O come, O come, Emmanuel!

Parades, Protests, and Preparations

A packed weekend:

1. On Friday night, we went to the 'Parade of Lights' that wound through downtown Denver. There were floats, marching bands, pom-pom dancers, a couple in a rickshaw with a sign on back that read, "She said yes!", and of course, Santa made his grand appearance in a gigantic sleigh as the parade's finale.

2. Saturday morning, I 'put my feet where my beliefs are,' to paraphrase a wise housemate, and attended a pro-life rally in northeast Denver to protest the impending construction of the largest Planned Parenthood building in the US. I'd never been to a rally before, and was super-nervous, not sure if I would find angry, single-issue voters fixated on other people's mistakes. I was pleasantly surprised to find a mild, amiable group (plenty of parents with young children). We listened to a speaker talk about Planned Parenthood's philosophy and underhanded business strategies (learn more at Pro-life work in Denver) and then marched around the block once, while singing 'Amazing Grace.'

So this is what I've learned about the value of protests: a) They force you to choose sides, to speak with your presence a stance that previously had been affirmed more hesitantly, and for me this forces me to not make the fact that many issues are 'gray and complicated' into an excuse to not make a decision about them. b) They remind you of the heart of a democratic society - the freedom to assemble and to speak, and to engage in public life about the most important and delicate of issues.

Needless to say, I've been thinking a lot lately about the sanctity of life, cultural messages about sex, and political implications latent in the pro-life movement (like: just because something is legal does not mean it is right. What else could this apply to?)

Link to Planned Parenthood to learn more about their philosophy and programs.

3. Saturday afternoon - back at our cozy house, making Christmas crafty gifts with a dozen 'Transition students,' young adults with developmental disabilities. We made greeting cards, napkin ring holders, snowflake spa mix, magnets, you name it, we made it!

4. Sunday - Happy Advent!!!! O come, O come Emmanuel. I love Advent. So much. We got out the Nativity scene (Baby Jesus is carefully hidden...) and for prayer last night we made a 'Jesse tree' and lit the first candle in our Advent wreath. Advent is so...expectant. It makes me think a lot about Mary being pregnant and about the hope latent in unexpected places.