The shortest day, a long soft night. We've had busy social times here, and more travel, festivities, and family time are planned. The next few days--actually, next week or more--will be packed. But right at this moment, after friends over for dinner have left, the house clean, warm and cozy, it's a moment of quiet, the right sort for solstice--a moment to breathe. It snuck up a bit this year, seeming sudden. Though it's the official start of winter, it's also the start of a long sigh of relief, to be turning back towards the sun. From here on out, it gets brighter.
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| Winter light through hoarfrost on the fence wire. |
I'll leave you with a section of a traditional Irish blessing, from the collection
Earth Prayers, edited by Elizabeth Roberts and Elias Amidon:
May the blessing of light be on you, light without and light within. May the blessed sunshine shine on you and warm your heart till it glows like a great peat fire, so that the stranger may come and warm himself at it, and also a friend. And may the light shine out of the two eyes of you, like a candle set in the two windows of a house, bidding the wanderer come in out of the storm.
As I move into winter and more moments of sunlight, I hope to bring them in with that goal--to let that light shine out as well, welcoming and warm.
Happy Solstice, everyone.
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