My best friend and I have been traveling together since 1992. Even when she moved to Georgia in 2003, we still were able to go on trips together, usually at least once every season.

Not imagining that the country was about to close due to the pandemic a year ago, we had decided to take what we call “a lark” to one of our favorite museums, Crystal Bridges, in Bentonville, Arkansas. We wanted to view an exhibit, All Things Being Equal, which featured the art of Hank Willis Thomas. It was a deep exploration of the African American experience.

Little did we know that it would be our last trip together for a year. Little did we know how the exhibit would inform what would unfold in the months ahead as the pandemic deeply exposed the even more serious divides of color, economics, and access in our country.

So many times as my friend and I moved through the year cancelling trips planned together and others to visit family, we would be ever so thankful for that quickly planned and taken trip in February, 2020.

Newly vaccinated, one year later, we booked our first trip together for a new exhibit at Crystal Bridges, Crafting America. This exhibit celebrates the stories told through that which we create with our hands.

The exhibit features craft by people who are both native to our country and who immigrated from a variety of countries for a variety of reasons.

One piece that gave me pause was a chest of drawers created by Gentaro Kenneth Hikogawa, a man imprisoned in a Japanese American internment camp during World War II. Needing a place for storage in that prison, he used scrap lumber and packing crates to create something of great beauty. It now sits in a museum and tells a story.

Another part of the exhibit displayed “beaded prayers.” For the past twenty years, Sonya Clark has invited others of all ages to create prayers from scraps and beads to express grief, hopes, and dreams. Over 5000 people from thirty countries have crafted duo prayers—one to keep and one to join the communal artwork.

The exhibit covered four walls, and the room shimmered with holiness when I entered. Each little creation had a story from the depth of a person’s heart.

We may think of crafts as being second to art. The exhibit reminded us that the root of the word craft means “strength” or “power.” In this year that has passed, so many times I have had no words for the depths of my feelings. This exhibit reminded me that there are many ways to express thoughts and feelings through hand work.

From baking bread to cleaning dusty blinds to hand written letters to songs sung to paths walked.

We can find strength. We can find power.

Thanks. Be. To. God.

I have decided that we have been in a continuous Lent since Ash Wednesday 2020. It’s a continuous Lent in that we have been on a wilderness road for the past year—full of uncertainty, surprises, dangers. And full of unexpected joys, provision, and God’s ever presence.

As we liturgically observed a new Lent this past week, it was the first year in forty years that I have not received the imposition of ashes. Without water, internet, or electric power, I decided to create a new practice. For this wilderness year.

A palm cross left from some other year’s observance fell out of a basket as I was tidying up. I decided to burn it as I worshipped via a concert viewed on line from Holy Family HTX. This was my Ash Wednesday worship.

A new Lent.

This first Sunday in Lent I am sitting in an airport preparing to fly to Dallas to visit my mother. She turns 95 tomorrow, and I haven’t seen her since my birthday in September.

I joined the sisters of Our Lady of Grace for Vespers last night for my worship. How grateful I was for electricity, internet, and water, even if it had to be boiled first.

A new Lent.

I’ve got my office in a rolling bag, and I’ll try working from my mother’s house.

A new Lent.

Surprises. Unexpected joys. Provision. And always, God’s presence.

Christmas Day Eucharist was always my favorite of the 12 Days of Christmas worship.

Entering the sacristy on a quiet morning. The church still full of the smell of incense from worship the night before. Celeste, the music director, and her family providing extraordinary music with at least three different instruments.

The people who came were always a mishmash of folks—some who had worked on Christmas Eve, people who wanted a quiet service, always a guest or two, and those alone for the day.

This year I’m one of those alone for the day.

I had planned to travel Christmas morning to Chambersville to be with my family. My vision isn’t great right now (cataract surgery in January!) so flying felt like the safest way to get there. My daughter was picking me up at the airport (masks on! windows open!). I couldn’t wait to be with my family (masked! outside whenever possible!). But I did the math (circles from pods! ages of us folk!) and listened to the beseeching of our mayor (please only be with your immediate family!).

Twelve hours or so before I was to depart, I cancelled my plane ticket.

Overcome with sadness, a kitchen full of baked goods and presents to be delivered in person, how was I going to do Christmas? Alone?

Granted, this is not my first Christmas alone. For the past twenty five years, Christmas Day was a work day, and family gatherings were usually scheduled for other times. Frankly, on a number of years, I was so tired from the Christmas worship marathon that napping like the baby Jesus in the manger was the most delicious way to spend Christmas Day. But this year, like so many of us, the feast I want was personal touch—being WITH people I love.

As I have done so many times this past nine months, I began to pirouette. If not this, where is the invitation?

Christmas Eve, I joined a friend for Instagram worship, lighting every candle in my house as I listened. Then my Bend family FaceTimed with me before and after I joined them via online worship at their church.

Still, I was so so very very sad when I woke up on Christmas morning. I texted with one friend and another and then got dressed and went to Eucharist at the Cathedral ( reserved seats! many feet apart! masked! no singing!)

As I entered, the usher who was to seat me in a safe place, asked, “One?”, and I heard, “Alone?”

The liturgy began with words I knew by heart. I began to cry, gently. Grief, yes, but also in delight at the beauty of the space, gratefulness for how much more I had than I didn’t have, and just the abundance of doing the best thing one could do on Christmas Day—adore Jesus.

Today is the second day of Christmas. I’m still a little sad. I’m still a little lonely. I’ll box up the presents I was going to hand deliver and mail to my dear family in north Texas. I’m going to drop by some folks’ homes that might enjoy some of the Christmas treats I had made to share with my family.

2020 is the year we all were invited to become prima and primo ballerinas and ballerinos as we mastered pirouetting. Yes, we lost a lot. As for me, in the midst of so much loss, I can see a longer list of what I am gaining as I, we, learn new dance steps.

And I am not alone.

We are not alone.

Have you noticed, that when people fly, there is so much hurrying?

Hurrying through security to put your bag on the X-ray machine. Hurrying to the gate. Hurrying to get in line to board and to quickly stow your bag in the overhead bin. Hurrying to depart. Hurrying. Hurrying. Hurrying.

Except each of those hurryings are usually followed by a pause.

Hurrying through security, bag quickly and urgently placed on the X-ray machine belt, then waiting on the other side.

Hurrying to the gate, and then waiting in an uncomfortable seat, hopefully with an outlet near by to charge a device whose power has depleted in the time passed from home to gate.

Hurrying to board and stash a bag, and impatient with whose who find boarding and getting settled complicated and then sitting and waiting for the doors to close. And then waiting for one thing or another to be tended to before finally departing.

At the destination, hurrying to get your bag from the overhead bin and then waiting in line to deplane and maybe waiting some more at baggage claim and then waiting yet again for whatever your ground transportation is for this trip.

All that hurrying. All that waiting.

Today, as I boarded my plane from Redmond to San Francisco (one of thirteen passageners—Coronatide), I noticed that we were all moving more slowly. At check in. At security. At the gate. People were nodding at one another and even exchanging quiet pleasantries. There just wasn that much hurrying (okay, except for the woman on the plane who realized she’d left her devices at the charging station at the gate and did rush to deboard to retrieve them).

I write this as I wait for my plane to be deiced so we can take off. The plane is quiet. The sun is rising. It’s Advent. Are we learning to not hurry so much? To rest in the wait?

This entire blog. Written in the waiting.

Third Monday in Advent blessings.