ABSORBING THE SEASON

I remember as a little girl trying to reach the pedals, stretching my spindly legs as far to the edge of the bench as it would hold me, while my hands moved up and down the keys.

It’s nearly miraculous to a child when she discovers the power that tiny fingers and feet possess—

C, C, C, C,C—I can feel the vibration as it resonates through my memory, pressing loud and insistent much like this grown-up world.

Did you know the birds rarely sing when it snows? At least the National Audubon Society tells me so. Like the damper pedal on mama’s baby grand, snow brings necessary quiet to the omnipresent, reverberating noise.

“Neener,” Daddy calls from the den. “Try another note instead.”

D, D, D, D, D—To him it’s a great deal of pounding, but I have a song building in me. Even without written music I can hear it in my head.  Slowly I sound out each note until something magical drifts in.  

Snow softly falling ushers a silent refrain. Her quiet is a needful departure from all the chatter, like wee birds hushed in recognition that the season of peace has begun.

The snow brings her gift of absorbing the sound. She is the damper pedal of nature, sent to bring the harsh vibration down. “Quiet,” she urges. “Still,” she implores while doing her best to soothe the burden we have all taken on.

C, C, C, C, C—if I let go of distraction, something beautiful comes to light. I can just begin to hear it, begging me to concentrate, urging me to free my ties to all that’s discordant, diminished, and dark.

Like the snowflake, we are porous. Be mindful of what is absorbed, engaged in, taken on.

In the snow—in the cold of it, the hush of it, I find my song.

“Daddy, can you hear, I figured it out?” And he kneels beside the bench and listens.

C# D C# B C# D D# E

F# G# A B A G# F# E

I’m dreaming of a white Christmas

Just like the ones I used to know…

NOTES:

For many years I was a shopping center marketing director. My display team and I would work through Thanksgiving to debut our Christmas décor [like magic] the next day. As a young working mother, my season was absorbed by making the season bright for other families, while wrapping my own boys' presents deep into the night. 

Despite what seemed [then] as a premature “ushering in” of the Season, I always found myself wishing I had just a little more time... to cuddle with little jammie-clad boys by the twinkling tree, to remind them, and me, of what all the fuss was really about.

I share all this to tell you, it snowed last night! And I am once again reminded that it’s never “too early” to celebrate what you love. Be swift about it. Be mindful. Don’t be late.

Absorb it all. And let it become how you live each day. 

With love, jk