No time like the present for this year’s missive. I’m usually stirred by the Winter Solstice with thoughts of nature but this year found me preoccupied with lists and plans. For the first time in more than 2 decades, I am spending Christmas Eve and Christmas Day with my four siblings and their families. Three generations are coming together in Blowing Rock, North Carolina to celebrate anew and my heart is glad. As is my habit I took a winter’s walk this morning. The following words are the stream from my musings.

The mountains are breathtaking in their sturdy presence, a backdrop to birds and soft sounds quietly caroling the arrival of Christmas Eve; as moss-covered stones, glistening white bark, inky red berries, and evergreens, still rooted deep in the earth, chime in to punctuate my Winter’s Walk. A symphony of nature, to ground our hearts and souls and bodies in this present moment, of Christmas 2019, of Christmas, come again and circling to a clear awakening of 2020 vision. Let our hearts be glad, our souls be merry, our minds released to allow peace and a frolicking sense of mirth and perhaps even a bit of mischief. Joy, oh joy! Let it reign, for Christmas has come again to lighten our darkness, so we may see our world and ourselves as we truly are, and to shine a light on a pathway forward.

Merry, Happy, Joyful Christmas to All