Advent, Lent and Ordinary Time

Growing up Catholic, I knew the the "seasons" of the Church calendar at one time. Now, not so much. But I do know the Big Three, and for different reasons, I love each of them.

Advent, of course, is the season anticipating Christ's birth. I am not ashamed to admit that I have taken the Christmas season (which technically follows Christmas) and super-imposed it onto Advent. I love the carols, I love all of the decorations. While we read Sadie her favorite book "Fancy Nancy's Splendiforous Christmas" almost every night, I can't fathom waiting until Christmas Eve to put up and decorate your tree. We will be lucky if we wait until the day after Thanksgiving to do ours. I just love everything about the anticipatory feeling of waiting for Christ's birth. And I love the whole manger concept, that it was the pure souls of the animals who received Him first. Sadie has another book called "Room for Little One" that has the most beautiful illustrations of the animals who invite the Tired Donkey (and Mary and Joseph) into the stable "There's always room for a little one here." after they invite all the other animals needing shelter and safe care. It is like the first time we turn on the radiator heat in our tall drafty house... there is just instant warmth. We love Advent.

And the last few years, we have loved Lent too. In the past for me, Lent was always a time of suffering and doing-without. I remember the rainy season in college in Williamsburg, and to me, that epitomized Lent. Duck boots, eyes cast downward, sprinting from class to class. Waiting for Spring. More anticipation, but not like the happy anticipation of Advent.  Until, that is, my third tri-mester with Sadie.

Lent with Sadie was not a season of doing-without.  It was indulgent, and not just in terms of food. Everything in my life was full in the most marvelous way. I truly felt like Jesus rose for us a few months early and I had him all to myself. Never before in my life did I feel that I embodied a Blessing in my belly like I did with Sadie those last few months of pregnancy.  Lent has always meant something more to me since then. It doesn't mean suffering, it means contemplation. It means making yourself ready.

And there is a lot to be said for Ordinary Time. In fact, we could use a few more weeks of it honestly in our house. Just some stillness. The weekends fly by with such rapid speed now that I blink, and they are over. And yet my nights of insomnia or restlessness and worry, those seem to drag on. Sadie calls me at work and begs me "when are you going to come home Mama?" and my heart breaks for her. And yet I get there sometimes, and she chooses a silly television show over our time together and I realize that she is growing up and really doesn't need me the way that she used to.  And then, hours later, I lay in her bed with her and she holds my hand as she falls asleep and I pray inside my head "stay like this forever little girl, know that I adore you."  The moments pass though, there is too much to be done, to get ready for this or that, to clean up from that or this.

I want the next two weeks to fly by, and yet, I want some moments to last forever. 

Saturday we took Sadie apple picking at Carter's Mountain Orchard. Sadie was so excited about going to the mountains, she had been asking about it all week. We turned off the main road to take the road up the mountain and she was gleeful in the back seat. "I love it here!!" she called out. Just from the beauty of seeing it. Just from the elevation lifting her upward in a car. She was gleeful!  She is such a celebratory child. And there I am, teary with emotion "remember this moment remember this moment remember this moment" I told myself as I watched her see the Purple Mountains Majesty for the first time in her life.

I found this picture today... it was a picture my parents took at their house the day Mark and I announced to them that we were pregnant. This picture is all seasons, Lent, Advent and Ordinary Time. Nothing guaranteed that this pregnancy would last... I think this picture was probably taken within a week of a positive test. We didn't know what exactly we were anticipating by this point. And honestly, things felt  pretty darn ordinary here.  We were just enjoying it. We were hopeful.

That's what I want for right now. I just want a few weeks of being hopeful. Not worrying about the consequences. Not wondering if I have made a good or bad decision in the past.  I want just a mini-season of Hope.  Maybe after all, that's what Advent is.