The Wonder Report: February 15, 2025

The Time and Space to Be More Fully Human

Feb 15, 2025

Happy Friday! It’s good to continue to write in this space, though the time between the last post and this one was much longer than I intended. I’ve committed to myself (and secretly to you, only you’re just now hearing of it), not to apologize or explain the reasons why my appearances here may not be as consistent or frequent as I’d like, except to say that I’m learning what it means to be a writer and a full-time librarian, among other responsibilities. Beyond that, explaining the specific details each time will be tedious for us both, and I’d much rather spend my time writing more interesting things. Suffice it to say, I’m glad to be here now.

For as long as I can remember, the issue of time and how to make the most of it has been a struggle for me. I’ve been reading and considering the reasons more carefully for a while now, and I’d like to invite you into a conversation about the topic over the next several months. Today is a bit of a start in that direction with a few reflections on the liturgical calendar, specifically how it gives me sace to feel all my feelings and how it sets a pace of life for me that’s more attuned to the reality of being human.

Here we go!

Growing Season, or the Season of Disappointment

Three Sundays ago, I was with the kids during our church service, trying with little success to convince eight 2- through 9-year-olds to sit quietly on the green felt squares I had scattered around the floor. Some of the kids sat on the squares as intended, but some wadded them up beneath them, others used them like small blankets.

“Does anyone remember why our felt squares are green again this week?” I asked, trying to get their attention so we could start. We coordinate the colors of the felt squares with the table linens on the altar and the vestments the clergy wear based on the liturgical season. Purple for penitential seasons like Advent and Lent. White for Holy days. And green …

“Because it’s growing season?” one of the older girls guessed.

“Yes! It’s officially called ordinary time, but it’s a season of growth,” I said. “You’re exactly right.”

The little ones grew interested for about 15 seconds, and then they were back to using their felt squares as hats and even balls. So I left my explanation at that and dove into our lesson on Psalm 23. But as I did, I considered the idea of “growing season,” thinking how ironic it is that a season in the middle of winter might be represented by green and have anything to do with growth.

I could have lingered on the idea longer, if I hadn’t had children to tend to and a lesson to present. But later, as I reflected again about this idea of a growing season, I wondered how it might connect to what I’d always thought of these weeks after Christmas, what I often refer to as “the season of disappointment.” There’s always so much expectation leading up Christmas, and then there’s the let down … of gifts that don’t quite fit and food that doesn’t quite taste like mom’s, of candles that drip on the table cloth and beef tenderloin that sets off the smoke detectors. Then there’s the broken Joseph. This year, I knew the minute Joseph flew off the end table and crashed to the floor that this was going to be an especially disappointing post-Christmas season.

Advent hadn’t even begun when I decided that this was the year that I would update my Nativity set. For the past several Christmases, I’ve gratefully displayed Mom’s Willow Tree Nativity, a beautiful barn with some sheep, a donkey, and the majestic figures of Joseph holding a staff and Mary cradling the newborn King.

Mom gave me the cherished set before she died, in the years when displaying it in her small room at the nursing home was not possible. Upon her offer to give the set to me, I insisted on only borrowing it “until you can use it again,” I’d said. I’m pretty sure we both knew that wasn’t going to happen.

I love the set’s simplicity with just the holy family and a few animals in the stable, but as I become more acquainted with the liturgical calendar, and we celebrate the incarnation not just for one day, but as a series of 12, preceded by Advent and followed by Epiphany, I’d begun to miss the other characters who were part of Christ’s birth narrative. I wanted shepherds to watch over their flocks during the weeks leading up to Christmas. I longed for wise men to travel from the East, arriving not on Christmas, but twelve days later on the feast of Epiphany. I thought more animals in the stable would better represent the lowly and not-so-quiet night that Jesus was born.

So, I got online, found the same vendor that Mom had ordered her nativity set from, and placed an order for the Three Wise Men and Shepherd and Animals sets, all 30 percent off with a coupon.

Within a few days, the wise men arrived, along with some cards and wrapping paper I purchased from the same company. But no shepherds. When I called to inquire, the representative acknowledged the mistake and agreed to send them right away. In the meantime, I discovered that the wise men, and soon the shepherds, were half the size I expected. After a little research, I discovered that Mom had purchased a special, oversized Nativity that included only the figures I had. The others I’d ordered this year were part of a smaller, and more complete, Nativity. So now I had tiny wise men, and soon would have tiny shepherds and animals, with an enormous Mary and Joseph towering over them. That wouldn’t do.

So, I got back online, ordered another smaller set of Mary, Joseph, and baby Jesus, and hoped against hope that they would arrive in time for Christmas.

The days ticked by. The shepherds showed up at our door just a day or two before our oldest son arrived home for the holidays. I checked on the rest of the order, and Mary and Joseph were still en route. By the time our second son arrived home with his wife, I’d put the wise men in the eastern-most room of the house to begin their journey, and the shepherds were, as they should be, watching their flocks on the end table. As for Mary and Joseph, a FedEx update told me they were still on their way, with a possible arrival date of December 23. I held out hope.

I was doing the final holiday baking during the mid-afternoon two days before Christmas when I heard our dog barking. This wasn’t her usual bark and stop, bark and stop to tell us a walker was passing by on the sidewalk or a bird was fluttering out of the tree in the front yard. This was the incessant barking of a delivery.

Mary and Joseph were here.

Because of complicated family dynamics and a slew of scheduling conflicts, our family of five gathers annually for a Christmas celebration on Christmas Eve rather than Christmas Day. This year, all the boys were coming as usual, along with our new daughter-in-law, plus my father-in-law and my husband’s aunt and uncle from out of state. We would be a group of nine.

On Christmas Eve morning, the kids all arrived early and were helping with last minute breakfast prep. The cinnamon roles were just out of the oven. One son was cooking the bacon, another the scrambled eggs. The third was keeping us company while he enjoyed his coffee. The tree was twinkling. The table was set.

Steve was watching the door, hoping to avoid the ringing of the doorbell, which makes our dog even crazier than the arrival of the FedEx man. When our last few guests arrived, he was there to greet them. As they came in, coats were shed and laid on the chair in the office. Packages were piled around the tree, and pans were hauled into the kitchen. Hugs were given all around. There were compliments on the delicious smells and congratulations for the newlyweds. And of course, the dog was barking.

In all the hubbub, I’m not even sure how it happened. The swish of a coat being removed? The bump of an armload of presents? Or, as is most likely the case, a vigorous wag of Harper’s tail? However it happened, I heard the gasps and turned just in time to see Joseph and his staff lying on the floor, broken, after less than 24 hours in our home.

Disappointment filled my heart, though I willed myself not to cry. Despite all the holiday activity swirling around me, I stopped what I was doing and dug through the closet to find the super glue. Brunch could wait a few minutes: I needed—with an unexpected urgency on an otherwise shimmery holiday morning—to fix the holy father. It seemed like the least I could do under the circumstances.

In quick order, the repair was successful. I had reattached the staff and lined up the broken edges with little sign of the calamity. If you didn’t know he’d been broken, you wouldn’t know. But I did. As I set Joseph back with his family in the manger, I whispered to our son, the one who knew how eagerly I’d waited for their arrival: “What would Christmas be without a little disappointment, huh? Somehow, this just feels more like Christmas now.”

I used to feel guilty about the wave of disappointment that always follows Christmas. There was always so much emphasis on the “true meaning of Christmas” and “Keeping Christ in Christmas” and “It’s more about giving than receiving.” By letting myself feel less than ecstatic, I thought I was somehow being shallow or petty. But there are so many expectations to manage, too, in a season that’s known as “The most wonderful time of the year.” Not to mention the exhaustion and overwhelm, since the season also seems to be “the most busiest time of the year.” And for a lot of us, the rituals of the holiday set us squarely outside our skill sets and comfort zones. How is it possible to choose the best gifts for every person on our list and host the perfect gatherings with matching linens and candles that never drip and spend extended time with family we see only once a year and not feel a little broken ourselves by the time it’s all over?

In recent years, however, I’ve tried to let go of the feelings of guilt, and instead, have come to accept my perennial disappointment as a natural and expected reaction to a string of stressful, if not joyous, holiday events. You could even say that disappointment, along with the whole range of emotions we experience during particularly challenging seasons, are actually built into the annual cycle of seasons and holy days known as the church, or liturgical, calendar. A feature, not a bug.

Despite the name, this all-encompassing way of keeping time extends far beyond the church pews into our homes, neighborhoods, and even workplaces, inviting us to linger in the hard and holy places that sometimes get glossed over with twinkle lights and tinsel or Easter grass and chocolate bunnies. The penitential seasons of Advent and Lent, for instance, welcome us to into weeks of fasting and prayer, taking time to consider our frailties and faults long before we ever enter the celebration and abundance of Christmas and Easter. A string of three feasts commemorating the martyrdom of Stephen, John, and the Holy Innocents in the first few days of Christmas remind us how broken the world was — and still is — when Jesus arrived in the manger. And after 40 days of Lent, slowing down to consider the events of each of Jesus’ final days before the betrayal and terror of his crucifixion casts a pall over our souls that only the wonder and mystery of resurrection could ever hope to dispel.

So, with the 12 days of Christmas long behind us, we’re in ordinary time again—ordinary as in “ordinal” or counting time. But with the help of the children, I’ve started thinking of it more and more as growing season, even if the post-Christmas disappointment is still lingering a little and the cold, gray days of winter seem to mock the whole idea of growth. But I also know that this, too, shall pass because Lent is coming, and eventually Easter, and rest assured, “The nights of crying your eyes out [will once again] give way to days of laughter” (Psalm 30:5, The Message).

I wonder … Do you experience disappointment this time of year, a sort of let down after the busy holiday season compounded by the cold and darkness of winter? How do you weather it?

The Human Pace of the Liturgical Calendar

Over the past few months since finishing grad school, and likely even before that — Since Mom died? Since I got married? Since my cancer diagnosis? Possibly since I was born? — I’ve struggled to know how to account for the time I’ve been given, to “number my days, that I may present to God a heart of wisdom” (Psalm 90:12). How do I wrestle the life out of each minute so I can accomplish all I’ve been called to? How do I make the most of each 24-hour day I’ve been given? How do I measure the worth of a week, a season, a year, especially as the pace of life quickens and coalesce’s through technological integration, automation, and even artificial intelligence? To really pull off my plans for this “one wild and precious life,” as Mary Oliver described it, I’ve felt the pressure to sleep less, plan better, and accomplish more. And if I don’t take advantage of every possible tool and resource at my fingertips, it’s my loss.

What, then, should I make of this rhythm of time keeping known as the liturgical calendar that brings us again and again, year after year, back to the same old story, back to the same rituals and holy days, back to Jesus who’s born again in the manger, presented again at the temple, tempted again in the wilderness, praying again in the garden, dying again on the cross, and rising again from the tomb? And what do we make of this Jesus who’s waiting again and again and again for us to meet him there, to know him there, to slow down enough to be changed by him there?

As I’ve been looking for a way to jump off the ever-faster treadmill of modern life in exchange for a pace that feels right for me, that feels more human, I’ve come as close as ever to finding it here …

… in the days of penitence and waiting during Advent and Lent.

… in the darkness and terror of Holy Week, followed by a 50-day celebration (50 days!) of resurrection in Easter, dripping with all of the joys of spring.

… in the festivity of Christmas, when it’s not a one and done celebration and then onto Valentine’s Day, as the big box stores might have us believe, but lingers for 12 days and includes, wisely, its own opportunities for disappointment and grief.

… and especially during “growing season,” as the children call it, two extended times each year when we encounter the mysteries of our life of faith through the quotidian realities of every day—realities that test our patience, demand our attention, and truly make our lives count.

I don’t follow the liturgical calendar perfectly, though I’m grateful to be part of a church that listens to its rhythms and holds me back from the rush I’m tempted toward in every part of my life. And I certainly don’t follow the liturgical calendar as a religious requirement or at the expense of my relationship with Jesus, as I might once have assumed of others. Rather, I experience it as an acknowledgement that life’s griefs and joys and disappointments connect us to something bigger, to Someone greater. And over the years, it has become like a “map we carry in our hearts,” as James K.A. Smith writes in How to Inhabit Time: Understanding the Past, Facing the Future, Living Faithfully Now, as an “attunement that calibrate[s] the spiritual timekeeping we carry in our bones.”

I wonder … how do you resist the temptation to let the speed of life get faster and faster? What habits or practices do you engage in to help you slow down?

Resources about the Liturgical Calendar

Over the past couple of years, as I’ve been learning more about the benefits of observing the liturgical calendar and the ways it keeps me centered in the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, several resources have stood out as particularly helpful. I’ll share three here:

Sacred Seasons: A Family Guide to Center Your Year Around Jesus by Danielle Hitchen — This is a practical guide for integrating everyday life into the rhythm of the liturgical calendar. It also includes a brief history of the various seasons and festivals, activities for observing, and even recipes. I also really appreciate the notes and bibliography of this book, which has helped me progress in my own research.
Living the Christian Year: Time to Inhabit the Story of God by Bobby Gross — This book explores the seasons and their themes through meditations on various scripture passages, many taken from the Revised Common Lectionary. It’s divided into weekly chapters, so it can be used devotionally. This book also offers thorough introductions to each of the major seasons in the liturgical calendar that includes information about traditional practices and disciplines that are often observed during specific seasons.
Hearthstone Fables by Kristin Haakenson, an artist, writer, and farmer in the Pacific Northwest. In this Substack, Haakenson offers creative support for seasonal, local, and liturgical living through her art and writing. She also explores the agrarian heritage of the church calendar, and how its ancient traditions can be weaved into our own lives & landscapes.

Well, you’ve come to the end of another Wonder Report. Thanks again for joining me. It’s a privilege to share this space with you and to enter into these conversations together.

As always, if you’d like to send me a note or ask a question, you can hit reply and end up in my inbox. You can also leave a comment over on the Substack app. I can’t always respond quickly, but I try to always respond.

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