Winter Solstice 2011 (six days early)

Winter Solstice 2011 - a reading (on YouTube)

Next week marks three significant anniversaries for me. The first is the 20th anniversary of Karen and I celebrating the winter solstice by lighting the house only with candles. The second is the 12th anniversary of the first solstice message I sent out, at least the first one I have archived. I have managed to put out a winter solstice message every year since. For just over five years, I've written seven other messages throughout the year to mark each of the eight Celtic holidays.

The third is the fifth anniversary of the test that led to Karen's diagnosis with breast cancer. That adventure started three days before the winter solstice of 2006 with what should have been a routine mammogram. As fate would have it, I'd accompanied her to that appointment as we'd planned to kick off her vacation by doing some things together downtown that day. We spent that winter solstice trying not to worry as we awaited more appointments for more tests, which eventually led to her surgeries and treatment. That year is not one of our better holiday memories, though we are thankful we can look back on it with the good fortune of having everything turn out ok.

This year, I had planned to write a winter solstice message from the cat's point of view to celebrate these three anniversaries. Before I tackled that, I'd planned to have the final installment of the Abrami's Sister cycle posted. And another Christmas story out for which I'd jotted down an idea late last year. I'd planned to review where my writing was headed and how to approach each of the various websites I maintain. At Samhain, achieving all those goals still looked promising.

Once again, the universe laughed at my plans.

The words "cancer" and "chemo" have made a reappearance in my life. They entered in mid-November when I received a card from my father telling me he had lost his voice. Three weeks later came an email saying it was from cancer. Two days ago, another email arrived saying it was aggressive and that he starts chemo next week.

My father and I aren't what you'd call close. The people who know me know why. With Karen in 2007 I knew my role and my responsibilities. They were written in my wedding vows. This situation is more complicated. Once, I wanted to prove I was somehow worthy of this man's affection. Now, those thoughts are ashes blowing through barren fields. And yet I still feel empathy and sadness for his situation.

Since that first note, my writing has become frustratingly sporadic. I have completely sketched out the last Abrami's Sister story. I can see all the details but haven't been able to download them from my mind. I want to write, but I've found I've been waiting for news that is slow in coming from a man who, on the best of days, is not what you'd call a natural communicator.

Writing at its heart, whether a story, an essay or a memoir, is about communication. Most days, I struggle with how much of my personal life to reveal to strangers, what to say and what to leave unsaid. There is no point to this message, no clever words, no epiphany, no surprise that ends in hope. I feel trapped between empathy and history. Expressing that is all this message is about.

For decades, I haven't liked this time of year. The holidays strike me as fake, false, a saccharin-sweet fiction like Santa Claus, or the false-front Potemkin village that are the pictures from my childhood. I began celebrating the winter solstice twenty years ago as a way to reclaim this time, a way to make it my own. Our own. It turns out my wife's family life needed a little rehabilitation, too. Maybe everyone's does.

In a hundred years, no one will remember any of the events I struggle with. In the light of history, they will be meaningless statistics at best. In the light of nature, they already are. The flowers in the garden don't care about my struggles. Neither do the squirrels, the birds or the cats. The sun still moves through its progression. In a week, the winter solstice will arrive whether I'm ready for it or not. Even if I do not mark it, the darkness will approach and recede.

This week, I read a quote attributed to Steve Allen that said, "If you pray for rain long enough, it eventually does fall. If you pray for floodwaters to abate, they eventually do. The same happens in the absence of prayers." I don't pray for people or their situations. It's not in my makeup or a part of my beliefs. I think about them, I worry about them, I reach out to them, I help them if I can. And I light a lantern for them to help me remember.

When Karen and I were married, we received two Wolford lamps as a wedding gift. For the longest time, we lighted the pair of them on the winter solstice. One year, I broke one of them moving a piece of furniture. The survivor now lives on the stove. We light it when our friends or family are sick. We light it when someone we care about has died. And we still light it on the winter solstice to celebrate the night, as we hopefully will again this year.

As long as we're home over this holiday, that Wolford will be burning as a reminder. I don't know what the immediate future will bring. I don't know how I'll react to it. But that has always been the case. Life is fundamentally what happens while we're making other plans.

Whatever your plans for the approaching holiday, may the memories you form be pleasant and your treasures be left unbroken. And as always, may your solstice be warm and bright.

© 2011 Edward P. Morgan III