(originally posted January 2018)
I know I’m late to the party. 21 days late to be exact. But nonetheless, happy New Year to you Mr. January. You came in quick and gratefully, you are exiting slow.
I didn’t know it when the year started, but I needed a slow down. The kind of lazy days where your house is a wreck and you have no mind to care. The kind where your tires rest comfortably in a cocoon of snow, for days… FOUR days to be exact. The kind where you carelessly sleep away EVERY SINGLE toddler nap time for a week.
I didn’t know it then, but the life sucking cold you gave me in the middle of your month, Mr. January, is JUST WHAT I NEEDED. I am rested now. I am awake now. I am ready to resolve now.
To be frank, I am never too thrilled to say hello to you. Five days in, every year, you deliver me another number on my cake. I guess that’s your way of saying happy new year. This year there was a faint little number seven trailing after that three. A number 1 that I could have just as happily left a zero. Not because, I am afraid of getting wrinkles, those are already coming. Or losing my carefree days of youth, those are already gone. But because it serves as a reminder that, everyone around me is also aging. Time is ticking along. And although I have come to peace with the fact that each year you bring me another birthday, I am not yet sure how to come to peace with your fellow months bringing birthdays and years passed to the ones I love.
She was 88, my beautiful grandmother, Janice Violet. Just a few weeks shy of 89 candles that would have been delivered by your fellow month, February. A beautiful life well lived. And with her passing in the middle of your month, I can’t help but think of everyone else I love. Friends and family alike. How many times more will they get to say Happy New Year to you Mr. January? I’d like to think that the time is endless but it’s not. We never know how many January’s we will be given. Or how many good January’s we’ll say hello too. Someone could get sick or hurt or worse. Those I love, that I often take for granted. Those near and far. My time with them is limited, and as I lay sniffling on the couch this week I rested and reflected.
What I am doing with that time? Am I truly marking my days according to God’s will or to my own? Am I taking the time to position my life in the presence and service of others? Or am I just simply crossing off days on a calendar, never intentionally cultivating and nourishing the relationships that he has already put in my life and on my heart? What do the people in my life need from me and am I giving it to them?
So this year, I have one simple resolution. To find the answer to those questions. To search deep, ask hard questions and have some even harder conversations. To be true to myself and the God I serve, whom values relationship intensely.
“Be completely humble & gentle; be patient, bearing with one another in love. Make every effort to keep the unity of the Spirit through the bond of peace.” Ephesians 4:2-3
Blooming And Becoming 