Category: Advent

It is beautiful here.  Snowing again — fine, eccentric flakes glimmering in the sun.   The driveway never catches the light — which means that the 18+ inches of snow might be problematic for quite a while.  But at my desk, it is warm and bright.

And I love it.

More that the view, I love the sound — the lack of sound.  A deep still silence broken only by the occasional bird chirp.  This is such a contrast to the usual state of the rectory:  constant chatter and laughter and screaming from the school kids as they walk back and fort to the hall; the regular whoosh of cars and thud of doors.

The silence is so precious that I don’t want to break it.  Or miss it.

Several of my more extroverted friends are getting restless.  They are tearing through work, knee deep in show to run errands.  A part of me wishes I had their restlessness, their energy.  I would get much more done.

But snow brings out the huge gulf between introverts and extroverts.

I just love this:  the silence, the stillness, the lack of pressure to go anywhere or see anyone.

And I am getting things done — cleaning bits of the house that I haven’t seen for a while.  Helping people learn how to use WordPress.  Doing odds and ends for Christmas.  Catching up with that endless pile of things that are always needing attention but never quite urgent.  But I thought I’d be further through it by now.

No.  It seems there is enough to do to keep me busy for days, weeks like this.

And there will come a day (tomorrow, perhaps) where I have to choose to leave the peace and the silence, lest I get trapped here and forget how to emerge.

But for now it is glorious, and healing.   Less productive this week, perhaps; but in the long run, this is more productive, more creative.  The weeks ahead will be better, and easier because of it.

I am envious of my extroverted friends energy, of their productivity.

But this is weather for introverts, and I am suddenly at peace.

When Advent rolls round, or Lent, and it’s time to sort out the seasonal blogs, I think ‘why do I do this?’

I dare not think how many people I have taught to use wordpress, how many times I have talked people through signing up and learning to post.  I’m becoming much more blasé about it now that so many more people are blogging.  But still, it takes time, when I haven’t had much blogging energy for quite a while now.

But then it begins:  a flurry of emails to set it all up.  A new author whom I sense has the eagerness that some of the old hands used to have.  My most dependable, mistreatable author ready to jump in with today’s post with no warning — and what a post it is.  A whole group of people ready to step out on the ice, take a risk, try something new.

I love it.

And after a few hours of making it all work, I clicked on the blog one last time to find that someone totally new, totally unknown had found it by accident and read through all the back posts.

And that makes it worth it.   Every time.