Joy and Wonder, Life and Love

Wishing you

this holiday season

We have once again stepped through the longest night of the year and now ever so slowly the light returns. For those who are grieving and lost may you find comfort in the growing light, may the dark sorrows lessen with each breath, and may you see the world once again through eyes of wonder and gratitude.

To Know the Dark

To go in the dark with a light is to know the light.
To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight,
and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings,
and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings.

— Wendell Berry

We said goodbye to my cat companion, soma yoga buddy, purr-fect friend Gracie on December 22. I am grieving her death. And I am thankful for every minute that she was with me. Everywhere I turn I am reminded of her sweetness and the joy she brought to my life.

Gracie as a kitten, she always wanted to be near my face.

And as with prayer, which is a dipping of oneself toward the light, there is a consequence of attentiveness to the grass itself, and the sky itself, and to the floating bird. I too leave the fret and enclosure of my own life. I too dip myself toward the immeasurable.”
― Mary Oliver, Winter Hours: Prose, Prose Poems, and Poems

As I walk through this celebration of the return of the light and of love and grace I stumble over a ghost cat who walks beside me reminding me of all of the ways she brightened my days.