First Snow 2011

Snow came earlier than we expected this year.
I decided to go through some of my older writings and put them together for you.  Enjoy.

Snowflake by Emily and Grace

The first snow brings a new covering

A bright mix of colors

White with gold and cobalt blue

Clear crystals sparkle the world into new

Hope falls softly on ivory statue

Elegantly robed, with golden band

Hidden in gentle shadow from hell's demands

Kept quiet and safe

Until the moment we see it full face

Ice petals form into winter's bouquet

Gracious swans glide and make their way

Through ice and cold and lonely wait

For Father Winter's command

 When it comes,

Will you offer your hand?



Dar Luz
My grandfather once told me this story of a missionary who went to the Amazon. He was new, just learning the language, and he needed some supplies. So he went to the village general store and asked for a candle. The owner gave him a puzzled look and asked what for. The missionary said, "You know, a candle, to give light." At this, the owner looked downright offended. The missionary realized something was a bit off in their communication. He discovered that instead of a vela (which means candle) he had asked for a velha (an old woman). But it gets worse. "Dar luz" which means give light, is also the Brazilian way of saying "to give birth", in other words to have a baby. So instead of asking for a candle for light, he'd asked for an old woman to bear his child. A great first impression.


To give birth, to give light. Life and light are often connected in the Scriptures. John 1 is a beautiful example of this. There is a sense of expectancy, something coming that has been in the works since the beginning, but is only now coming into its fullness.


I took the picture above the day after the snowfall earlier this week. I had let Sam out into the field to play and was so struck by the light on the snow that I ran in to get my camera. The whole field was blanketed in white and glistening with crystals. And I thought, "What would the redeemed world look like?"

Instead of the black night sky speckled with the light of the stars, maybe it will look like crystals on white snow.


I think it will be beautiful.


Wonderland
Ted and Nancy Johnson drove Matt and I to Oregon.  We had a long day in Portland, and arrived at our hotel on the Columbia River just as the rain and sun set in.  Nancy got it in her head that she wanted to find the alpaca farm for knitting yarn.  The men were tired, but I'm always up for an adventure.  We weren't sure if it would be open for business.  It was late in the season and as we ended up taking the long road there, it was late in the day, too.  Finally, after following sign after sign after sign, we knew we were close.  We traveled through orchards and vineyards and golden fall foliage before we found the alpaca farm. It sat up and into the hills. With the elevation came an unexpected transformation.  Rain turned to snow.

The memory of it all still takes my breath away.   Each delicate flake was so defined I could almost discern its pattern from afar. Silence fell upon us as the sky powdered the tallest, straightest, evergreenest trees I had ever laid eyes on.  Like feathers gently blessing every branch.  We were blanketed in beauty and I thought to myself, I don't think I have ever seen anything quite so lovely in all my life.  And yet, I had never expected snow to captivate me so.  I love the sea. It's always been my muse. But here I was, lulled and rocked by another sort of wave.  Snow sweetening every surface, frosting the world before me, bringing crystals to my eyes. I didn't want it ever to end.
  

Holly

To keep quiet, to not write is the easy thing.
To write so that the heart can express itself and yet veil it's meaning--and to do so beautifully--
that is a gift when it comes.
Today I had not that gift.

But I did go out in the cold for just a few minutes.  To see a holly tree.  I am captivated by them.
Did you know they only grow berries if they have a mate?
You might call it a scientific fact, I prefer to think of them as romantic.

I found her undisturbed since the snowfall. Bright sturdy green leaves, cradling tender red berries, bowed under the weight of winter's covering.

Only for a moment did the light break through the clouds and shine upon it.
That was my gift today...and a photo by which I can remember it.

snow falling

fall snow

there's beauty in the overlap, you know

Love Covers

Falling Together

We don't all go through seasons of change in concert.  In two weeks I'll be entering summer on the day most of you will be entering the first day of winter.  I often feel like I'm in a different season than most people. But there are those brief moments when we seem to be in the same place at the same time.  In those moments we can feel like one.  Maybe even really be one.  Not forging ahead alone or trying to catch up from behind. We can see the same things, hear the same songs, write the same lines, maybe even breath the same air in our lungs.

It's an Oasis.  A rest in the desert.

But winter will close you in soon and lock you up under it's cold blanket, in it's white safety.

And me?

Well, I'm going to be stringing a hammock under those palm trees, drinking out of coconuts, and using only enough sunscreen to keep skin cancer at bay.  Oh--and flirting with seagulls.

This is the thought we can share until then.  Love covers over a multitude of sins. 

Sometimes with snow.  Sometimes with waves. 

Rest in that.


Virgin Snow

Sam--Disturbing the Peace

Photo by Bgrace

"For nature and art are in this way twins:
they are both beautiful and dreadful, and in love with change."

Mary Oliver, Winter Hours

Snow was still settling onto the landscape as I set out for my morning walk.  Sam paced despairingly, unable to fathom why he couldn't join me.  "I'll come back for you soon," I promised with a scratch behind his ears.  I silenced his whines with a firm close of the door.  Sam and I have different ideas about capturing wildlife.  Not that I was particularly set on photographing bird or beast.  This day was for observing, listening, inhaling and embracing the sweet silence of cold peace undisturbed. 
I made my way to the temple hill and faced the wooded slope, conflicted.  The snow perfectly blanketed the hillside before me.  A surge of satisfaction shot through my frame.  I was about to go where none had traveled--at least not since the last snowfall.  Magellan must have felt this times a million. What treasures would I be the first to find?
But there was a sadness too.  My own boots would bear the guilt of crime; the untouched and untainted soon marred with my footprints.  So it is with every step into the untraveled. 
We embark on discovery and risk the uncertainty of the unknown,
anticipating the rewards of a virgin quest; 
To gather up sites unseen and beauties unbeheld;
To bring home an armload of treasures or perhaps a lone, precious jewel.   
Yet the greatest blessing can never be shared,
or carried back.
Once our path is carved along the unexplored,
it is no longer that.
I step forward, upward, without a glance behind.
The pleasure of discovering will exceed anything I find.

The Bluejays

Hurling, swirling through the air

Around my father's tree

 Hoping when the spring breeze blows

 They will fly to me

Flash of cobalt in the snow

 Recalling blessings due

 One, two, and two more

 All blue but one, another hue