Christmas Letters

I like getting Holiday letters from friends and family. Last week we got a holiday letter from one of Kathy’s daughters, as is her tradition, and as I read it I savored every carefully chosen word, every line, as I always do when I read her letters. She has a way with words that captures their playful essence beautifully, and in true holiday fashion, she sums up the year’s highlights with vivid images of shared love, laughter, and visual treats. I remember when we were growing up in Nigeria how we always looked forward to receiving “Christmas letters” from friends and family flung far and wide. I remember how my parents, especially my mother, savored them. She loved a good summary of life. Dad typed a few of the letters, which was rare, and his way of summing up our lives for their readers was always fun to compare to mother’s.  A line or two about each of us children, a paragraph or two about the adventures of “African life,” details of teaching and learning and always a few to perfectly capture a delightful personality who had become part of their social or professional network. 

Christmas in Africa was very different than in America in some ways. The sun shone brightly, and often we swam on Christmas Day, after early morning gift sharing, and shared sentiments of the meaning of the season and all we were thankful for.  It seemed a little strange to see our spindly fake fir shining with tinsel and shiny ornaments in the warm weather and being steeped in Perry Como and Bing Crosby’s I’m dreaming of a White Christmas. Yet it would have also seemed strange not to have it, and not to hear our parents’ familiar songs. We were always reminded of being blessed to have so much when so many had/have so little. My brother Mike was especially conscious of this even as a very small child.

This year has been a year full of changes.  I’m amazed that we are ending December in our calendar year already! I’m amazed that 2011 is upon us. I marvel that the weather stations report record storms and cold throughout the country. What do I remember most fondly about this year? So many moments, so many memories. Right now I remember Thanksgiving with family, and my little niece Banner, the cutest princess in the world, living her charmed life with total joy and the enchantment of being a princess in this big world. Her full-teeth smile which holds such joy as my brother calls to her, Hey Hollywood! This way! as she sashays by in her outfit complete with matching sunglasses. My Aunt, my mother’s twin, like a wonderful image of Mom alive and laughing, as they did together, and my Uncle, the consummate host and steady keeper-of-the-house. This Thanksgiving I met my new little cousin “Baby Henry” for the first time. What a doll. He is constantly in my mind’s eye now, as I get reminders of his growing and smiling, rolling and giggling. I remember driving in October and picking up my sister at the Airport, then going on to Birmingham where we visited Mike and his family. It was a wonderful “reunion” of sorts, and included a first-time visit to the missionary family reunion at Shocco Springs in Alabama. The annual missionary reunion included the traditional memorial tributes, this year Mom’s being part of the line-up. My sister and I, with a borrowed GPS, found a few spots to visit, and we sang our hearts out with childhood songs we had sung which had been triggered in our memory at the reunion. We laughed so hard we cried, and once or twice almost had to pull off the road. Some moments can never be truly appreciated except by those personalities present in the moment and on that memory node! I remember going to Birmingham on my birthday, where I saw my triplet brother then drove with my niece (home from college) to Houston, where I saw my triplet sister! Seeing them in different states on our birthday! What a treat!

Best of all is the gift of continuing to "Know Thyself" as I experience and share life and the knowledge that inspires me to continuing learning and growing in love. Today the sky is gray, the squirrels are busy, and the birds flit around from tree to tree, from bird feeder to fence post. Paperwork awaits, the coffee is delicious, and my thankfulness is infinite. Thank you friends and family, and all of my human family, known and as yet unknown. Happy holidays, and may we all create and enjoy a very happy New Year!

New Year's Day

Thank you, all of you pioneers, you creative beings! You know who you are...

As the last few weeks of 2009 have wound down, I have been thinking a lot about originality and creativity.  I remember flashbacks of moments in my life when I have felt absolutely creative, full of the untouchable spark that lights the moment like a comet in the sky of daily activity, just as I remember the sensations of weaving the tapestry of “ordinary” moments, time ticking by.  I remember once many years ago (eons) when I was visiting a musician friend (Tom W) in Madison, Wisconsin.  I’d never been to Madison, and had never visited my friend in his old “haunts” there. We’d met in graduate school. He was, and is, a musician extraordinaire, a tinkerer, an inventive mind, a family man, someone whose thoughts hum always, and his fingers follow, his voice humming too.  One night during the visit a number of his friends dropped in, and each of them seemed to play different instruments.  There was a piano in the room, so I wandered to the bench and listened. The room was rather dark (it was winter, so very cold outside), lit by lamps, and so many hands, voices, people playing different instruments was its own cacophony which delighted and fascinated me. The hum of creativity and their complete attention to the music-making in the moment was wonderful. I looked around for some sheet music. (I’d studied piano.) I was inspired and encouraged to join in. Yet I realized the block in my mind of, without the music, what could I add?  These were all musicians, each playing, doing “their thing.” I’m no musician. The thought surprised me, and I’ve thought about it since, whenever prompted – by the comet spark of Music within me, by the joy of others’ in their delight of creating, by the disparity of those who revel in it and those who keep to the more “ordinary” moments as though they have no music within them.  We are all made of music.

I love encouragement. Visiting my family during Christmas, I had the privilege of basking in the beautiful creative joy of my almost three-year-old niece. Her wonder, delight, expressed in laughter, her soft inquiring voice, that insistent smile, and the way she moves – all reminded me of the joy of just expression, when shared as the love of life.  As she anticipated the arrival of her grandparents, she ran to the door, carrying her doll, looked through the panes to see if the car was theirs, then jumped up and down with absolute delight, saying, This is Fun!!!  I laugh every time I think of her, and of her joy which she shared so freely.

I resolve to celebrate and share ever more these moments of life, and the joy of health, laughter, family, friends, creation itself and all I can add to it.  To the sweeping strokes of blue I’ve felt this year (2009), I will add more of the gold, the glints of light and white cloud which so delight me as I capture the images of sky above and around me.  My mind is ready for more, the nuances of exploration as we think through and live the joys of creation.  Here’s to the music makers within us all! The art of expression.  Art encourages us to live beautifully – as a friend pointed out last night, the four levels of us as energy encourage us to consciously choose, to live, to know – who we are, who we want to be, the potential within us, and the joy of understanding that we are Spirit beings learning to be human. Happy New Year(s)!