Advent 2012 (Second Tuesday)

Dec 11, 2012

in lancaster county, pa

 

I drive around and keep hearing these words from Christina Rossetti’s Christmas poem: “in the bleak midwinter.” They seem to fit the landscape this time of year.

Bare trees. White barns. Grey silos. Black laundry flapping on the clothesline at every Amish farm.

I’m trying to figure out why I love it so much. Why does this place feel like home when the palm trees and turquoise water of a backyard-pool never did?

I love the melancholy, the shadowy, the bittersweet. Hot tea, dark chocolate, sad songs. Always have.

It may sound as if I love darkness, but I don’t actually think that’s the truth.

I love the light, but light always shows up best in a dark room. Candlelight. Starlight. The light of a full moon. It is as if we must have both light and darkness together, side by side, in order to glimpse the Story.

“In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1:4-5).

That is a very good story (and I love a good story most of all).

 

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