Passing The Torch

I’m taking an on-line Advent retreat with Christine Valters Paintner, of Abbey of the Arts .   I confess, I would not be taking the retreat except that it’s part of the package for my Pilgrimage to Ireland next Spring.  It’s kind of one of those synchronistic things: I had been pondering Advent and how it’s been gift to me over the last couple of years, and I had thought about taking some kind of retreat, but not really focused on it. Then this offer came, and it was too good to refuse, so here I am.  The timing seems right. The subject matter is one of my favorites, "Birthing the Holy".

Christine opened our retreat talking about thresholds and how Advent is a sacred threshold, a space when we move from one time to another, or from one awareness to another as in times when our old structures start to fall away and we begin to build something new. 

I immediately sensed she was onto something and that this time was liminal space for me. I have known since my mother died in August that I am moving into a new thing. I have thought about it, even scheduled the pilgrimage to help me embody this new thing, but I had not really sat with the knowing. 

Then my son said it Saturday, as we celebrated Thanksgiving in his new home. As I was preparing to leave, he whispered to me, “Time to pass the torch Mother.”  Now I was able to put my finger on the feeling I've been having. I feel my mother’s presence as she seeks to pass the torch to me. 

Christine’s opening questions to us were: “What is the grace you seek in this season ahead? What is your heart’s deep desire?” Then as I was pondering the usual thoughts, she leaned in with another suggestion: “Before you let your thoughts rush in with their well-reasoned plan, see if you might lean into a deeper wisdom, listen to what your intuition and body are telling.” As I sat with the questions and the thoughts, I could feel my mother’s presence. When Christine suggested making a nature altar, I knew where I wanted to go.

I drove out to a friend’s property after church, put on my hiking boots, and took a short walk into her lovely woods. 

As I meandered through the brush and vines, I realized how many thresholds were there – openings into new spaces and new perspectives everywhere, so I paused at a few of them.

then I found her – the tree that I was looking for.  The tree that would help me answer Christine’s questions.

Next year will be a big year for me, passing from the middle years into the golden years, the “wisdom years”. I am headed toward 65 and Medicare. And I confess, I’m a little nostalgic. Perhaps that’s why I haven’t really sat with myself and observed what I feel happening in my bones. My mother is passing the torch to me. I feel it coming, the letting go of what has been, the sweet time being with my mother, and heading toward the days of being as my mother. It’s coming, as surely as the Light we wait for during Advent, old age is coming. The end is coming. 

So what do I want for myself for the next 20 years? I want my roots to deepen, my branches to spread, and my fruit to ripen. Branches that spread in order to offer shelter and shade, and fruit to ripen so that others can be nourished by my life. A large shade tree must have healthy roots, deep roots, roots able to draw up nourishment from the soil it’s planted in.

As I walked through the wood and after I sat with the tree, I knew it was time to make my altar, I took the few little nature items I had spotted and took them to this small Madonna, and left them there to mark my intention: to enter this time in my life with intention and focus, to face my old age, my golden years with my heart wide open, and to allow my roots to keep growing deep into Christ's Love so that the rest of my heart's desire can happen.

(two broken branches making a cross, bark that has been broken up and shed for the new, berries that nourish and add beauty, and mottled leaves that were once shade)