The Whatness of A Thing

Good Monday morning, good people of the Epiphany. There seems to be a great disturbance in the force. We are in the midst of a major snowstorm here on the Delmarva Peninsula. It started sometime in the middle of the night and, so far, as I look out my window, we have 5-6 inches out there now.

It is scheduled to end around 4 AM Tuesday morning, bringing with it periods of "the dreaded wintry mix" to freezing rain then back to "wintry mix" before switching back to snow again, which should make things quite miserable but it will most likely diminish the total accumulation

Of course, we are part of a large band of snowstorms that fits snugly around the midsection of America. Misery does seem to love company, so we're all commiserating together.

We do have food and warmth and electricity and even WiFi so, you know, there's no sense complaining about anything here. My first radiation treatment was canceled - the Cancer Center is closing at 11 AM - so my next treatment becomes my first treatment on Wednesday.

It's all good. I have great confidence in my "team". See? These days, when you get cancer, you get a "team". It's really pretty fantastic. My "Nurse Navigator" who sort of heads up the "Team" and helps you figure out what is happening next, called me at around 4 PM on December 31st, just to check and go over some stuff and answer questions so I would be prepared and not anxious. She's terrific.

I suspect this is why we've made such progress in the battle against cancer. It takes teamwork. Now, we need to get a "team" for Alzheimer's and Parkinson's and ALS and, maybe even prejudice and bigotry.

Today will be a perfect day to take down the Christmas decorations, as is tradition, at least among Episcopalians. You can, however, leave your creche (Nativity Set) up until Candlemas or The Feast of the Presentation on February 2nd. That is also the tradition in this house, along with leaving up our white Christmas lights in the windows and outline of the house.

It's a dark time for lots of people. The only thing that can cast out darkness is light, and, as for me and my house, we mean to bring lots of light into the next four years when the most vulnerable among us will be under the greatest threat.

Earlier this morning, I was reading James Joyce, whose writing really gave us a cultural understanding of Epiphany. In his 20s, as he was defecting from the Roman Catholic Church, Joyce drew up little sketches, sort of like "prose poems," in which he illustrated epiphanies.

He explained to his brother Stanislaus that epiphanies were sort of "inadvertent revelations," and said they were "little errors and gestures — mere straws in the wind — by which people betrayed the very things they were most careful to conceal."

He also wrote that the epiphany was the sudden "revelation of the whatness of a thing," the moment when "the soul of the commonest object ... seems to us radiant."

"The revelation of the whatness of a thing". I love that.

I think we had an "inadvertent revelation" about this country four years ago when "the whatness" of this country was laid bare before us on television sets and laptop screens.

And yet, this country seems to have done it again, but without the Brittany Spears "oops," even though the margin of the popular vote was only by less than one percent (Yes, I repeat that fact often to myself, as a comfort and a hope.)

So, today, in Washington, DC, there will be "the smooth transition of power" only because the sore loser won. Barely. The spiritual task seems to be to look for the radiance of "the soul of the commonest object".

Which, I'm thinking, is in our ability to be resilient. That's my word for this time in my personal life and my public life as a citizen of this country.

Resilience.

I'll have more to say about that in the days to come, but I'm not talking about just "bouncing back". I'm talking about a spiritual state of being that seeks out, finds, and strengthens what is already strong in you, things you didn't even know about yourself or, perhaps, only guess at or wished for.

It's a spiritual process that reveals "the whatness" of your soul, by which our souls find "radiance".

As I said, I'll have more to say on that later. Right now, I'm just watching the snow fall and accumulate while I get myself ready to take down the Christmas tree and rearrange the furniture in the sunroom.

Oh, and taking great delight in the unexpected joys of a housebound day. We'll be taking Eliot and Olivia out for their first experience of snow. We'll just take them out on the deck. It should be fun to watch their individual reactions.

I'll leave you with this.

A Poem by Jan Richardson for The Feast of the Epiphany
A Blessing for Women's Christmas
The Map You Make Yourself

You have looked
at so many doors
with longing,
wondering if your life
lay on the other side.

For today,
choose the door
that opens
to the inside.

Travel the most ancient way
of all:
the path that leads you
to the center
of your life.

No map
but the one
you make yourself.

No provision
but what you already carry
and the grace that comes
to those who walk
the pilgrim’s way.

Speak this blessing
as you set out
and watch how
your rhythm slows,
the cadence of the road
drawing you into the pace
that is your own.

Eat when hungry.

Rest when tired.

Listen to your dreaming.

Welcome detours
as doors deeper in.

Pray for protection.

Ask for guidance.

Offer gladness
for the gifts that come,
and then
let them go.

Do not expect
to return
by the same road.

Home is always
by another way,
and you will know it
not by the light
that waits for you
but by the star
that blazes inside you,
telling you
where you are
is holy
and you are welcome
here.
—Jan Richardson

I hope something good happens to you today.

Bom dia.