Oh my, oh my. Went to my granddaughter Erica's Christmas concert this afternoon - she appeared, grave and serious, in a gorgeous black-and-tartan dress worn several times by the girls in our family (a sort of heirloom now), singing Santa Claus is Coming to Town with graceful gestures that seemed almost Polynesian. She looked shockingly beautiful up there, and grown up.
So afterwards I went for coffee with my son's Mum-in-law, which I haven't for a while and enjoyed immensely. She insisted on giving us a beautiful potted poinsettia-and-white-flowers mix that will probably bloom lavishly in a day or two. Then came home to make chili, which I had planned to do yesterday and just ran out of time.
I don't enjoy cooking, even if I love the result, so I wondered what would make it go down better (besides that fizzy grapefruit drink I am so addicted to now, Dole Sparklers they're called). I thought, hmmm, let's put some Christmas music on! I haven't intentionally listened to a Christmas album yet this year. My hand just gravitated to Roger Whittaker, though my rational self was saying, "Margaret, NOT that sentimental old thing again."
Oh yes.
This was, in fact, a sort of test. I've tried to write about the spiritual meltdown I've experienced over the past several years, the fact that my entire belief system seems to have been blown to bits. Do I still believe in, well - God, or something like God?
Might it be a bit of a test to listen to this song, this song that always made me cry when my children were small?
This song that still made me cry last year? Was I so dried up, so hard-hearted, had I turned my face away from Love and Grace and all those things that used to hold my life together so much that my tears had turned as hard and crystalline as Lot's wife?
Friends, I cried. Did I cry! I bawled. It was wonderful, soul-rocking. I don't know what it is, perhaps just the way he sings it, and the deep truth of this: the only gifts that I could want are you. My darlings.
http://members.shaw.ca/margaret_gunning/betterthanlife.htm
