Down into the Cave

It felt like Advent this morning.

It felt like the waiting time, the time of going down into the dark, of winter gaining strength.

It felt like the cold was just starting up, like the sunlight was thinner.  At 9:30, there were still sunrise colors over Lake Harriet.

Going into the dark, carrying my little light.  Waiting for the turnaround, the days when the sun seems to remember us, finally, beginning to travel back up into the sky.

Today I could feel the bottoming out into the belly of the year.

When we touch bottom, with our toes, we can start to kick back up to the surface, back up to the light of spring.

Gotta hit the bottom first.  We have to reach down, way down into the deep.  That's where the treasure lies, down at the bottom of the abyss of cold and dark.  

And the journey back up to the surface will feel long, and cold, and sometimes scary.  I know there will be weeks I'm not sure I can make it 'til spring.

Carry my little light.  Feed it on love and hope, conversation and breath.  Keep the spark lit.

It felt like waiting, holding on, moving into the unexpected.  There is treasure down at the bottom of the wine-dark sea.  Bring it back up with you this time.  Something still and small waits, that you can't quite hear in the bright riot of summer.

Don't curl up, bearlike, stone-like, in the cave.  Keep the light on.  

We'll all kick off and push against our bursting lungs to surface together.  

If winter comes, can spring be far behind?

last year's nature table for this journey in.