Maggie and I, as is our habit in these later years, walk the little roads where we live, roads of macadam, gravel, and dirt, past the grazing horses in pasture in early morning fog, past the deer standing to stare only to leap vanishing into the obscuring mist, past the cottontail hiding in the low shrub to be flushed by the dog skittering zig zag in easy escape, observing the slow movement of this tilting Earth toward days of diminishing light approaching Solstice.
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Winter comes slowly in the South, Autumn lingers holding off the cold, but with each walk changes are seen, long shadows like cut silhouettes laid flat on the brown earth from a sun low on the horizon, muted color of foliage, the glory of Fall gone. Empty branches mostly, but for the Beech, stripped bare. Frost, like a crystalline shroud laid silently overnight on blade and leaf, sparkling in the first rays of a hesitant sun bringing feeble warmth to this day. The horses in blankets, coats thickening, breath in clouds of white.
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These days, the daylight hours, are more precious as they are attenuated, as if the sun is in a hurry to end its sojourn across the sky, no sooner does it rise than it begins it’s descent. We revel in those hours of light, dreading at times the long evening awaiting. For millennia we have been here, riding this tilting Earth, waiting in anxious anticipation for it to reverse and bring life back to the cold lands, powerful were those who could predict such, exuberant were the celebrations of the Longest Night, dancing with the bonfires upon the rebirth of the Sun God. With these colorful wreaths on old doors, we too celebrate, bringing symbols of verdant evergreen, succulent red, candle flame, and stories of an ancient birth and a Temple reclaimed into our homes to ward off the gloom of bleak midwinter.
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This is a time of re-assurance in a time desperately seeking re-assurance, we congregate, raise our voice in song, extend wishes of good will and, yes, wait anxiously as did the old ones and the old ones before them. We find solace and comfort in coming together, not fracturing in opposition. We find the new light as the tilting earth comes around by caring for one another, taking hand in hand as we move through this Yuletide.
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Our walk repeats as daylight is ending, familiar, cheering; it takes us past horses now gathered at a rusted tin roofed barn to receive grain harvested on longer, warmer days, past lamps beginning their glow from light post and window, past quiet woodland and field empty at this closing hour, past the majesty of a winter sunset alive in vibrant color, past the cool pockets of air, harbinger of approaching Solstice.
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May you and your loved ones join hand in hand and move through this Yuletide in Joy.
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