Well, to be honest, I think the Christmas decorations were already up by the time I posted our October update. Christmas sneaks earlier every year, seems like.
This month revolved around hospitals, vaccinations, consultations, rehabilitation (although really, “habilitation” seems more apt - he's not really "re" anything), with some mashed potatoes and spiced apple cider, a few pine cones and candles squeezed in between. And suddenly, it’s advent! But, just for a moment, I’ll pause and speak gratitude into a rainy evening.
- Thank you to each of you who thought of us in the past week with our baby’s most recent hearing check. We’re grateful for the 50 decibels and louder that he can hear, and look forward in hope to his next hearing check at six months. We’re thankful for each of you who sent a quick comment with encouragement and love. Truly, we could not weather these days without our cloud of witnesses.
- In a season where our church is suddenly without a pastor, we’re so grateful for many wise, creative voices who speak Truth into our community: God is faithful, beyond our controlling fears, God delights in diversity, and spreading out his people throughout the globe; at every moment, God reminds us: your technology, human cooperation, innovation and careful planning will never get you nearer to me. God strains toward humanity with an awesome intensity, while humans gesture limply back. Of all the world’s religions, Christianity is the one where God comes down rather than demanding that humans toil up.
- We’re grateful for the deep roots of this city. For thanksgiving, we invited neighbors for their first taste of American style thanksgiving food - mashed potatoes served next to rice balls wrapped in seaweed and sweet bean desserts (better double the sugar, the husband said, they’re Americans). These friends pre-date many of the existing roads in our city. Their family goes back, “oh maybe to about the Meiji Era, you know 1870s or so”, on this same land. It’s humbling to be the newcomer, and we will always be foreign. We’re grateful for a small spot in this place with a deep and intricate heritage.
- We’re grateful for a return to a new kind of normal, which allows our days to take on their rhythms and patterns: bike commutes, laundry, lunch boxes, walking the dog, chatting with neighbors. That friend who watches my three year old so I can sit over a cup of coffee with a friend in a tough season. And who let me watch her two year old so she can sit with a friend in a difficult marriage.
- I’m grateful for support networks for moms and kids in this community, two in particular, and that I am able to begin attending them again after a long season of bed rest and hospitalization. For the woman who met me in the park with a curiosity about prayer, who also - of course - used to work at the hospital for children with disabilities, where we now go often. Grateful that we ran into each other enough times walking on the river and playing in the park that we just had to become friends.
- We’re grateful - am I allowed to say this out loud? - to live in a country with an intact social welfare system, where we can rely on our city network to help support our new life with a child with disabilities. Gratitude, not politics.
- Grateful for the generosity of a sweet relative which allowed us to get away for a few moments, just to sit over a steaming bowl of uninterrupted ramen.
- And grateful now to begin advent with our kids; watch them anticipate the season, the stories and music; watch them wreak havoc on the decorations - the patient advent cast who travel daily around the house, enacting various plots and scenarios. Thankful they're made of sturdy wood!
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