Please Hold

It is snowing like crazy. Roads are closed down. Cars are in the ditch. Businesses are closed due to the weather. Grocery stores are short on eggs. Flights are being cancelled. Schools are on snow days. Plans are being put on hold. Earlier this morning our neighbor came to plow our road, and in the process got his rig stuck in the ditch. A few minutes later my husband and two other neighbors rallied together with snow shovels, tow straps, and pickup trucks to pull him out.

In short, it’s winter. The days are short, the nights long, and there is an otherworldly stillness that fills the air with the sound of silence.

Winter is a reminder that life is unpredictable. It can change in a heart murmur, a snowstorm, an icy patch of road, or a power outage. It’s a time to remember that we are meant to rely on one another. Check in with each other. Share a meal, lend a hand, and maybe a snow shovel.

Winter is a reminder of the importance of slowing down and allowing life to come to just short of a halt. We ignore these slower days at our own peril. Times of dormancy are necessary for life to spring forth in new ways. In nature, and, in our bodies, our work, and our souls.

Winter is a reminder to be present to the here and nowness of our lives. It invites us to set aside our to-do lists and settle in for a spell. Lord willing and the creek don’t freeze, there will be ample time to get back into the groove of doing. This short season offers the possibility of establishing a pace and a rhythm for the year before the year establishes one for us.

I’m writing this as I am on what might be a five-hour hold time to book reservations for a much anticipated trip to Scotland later this year. The snow continues to fall outside my window. There are good leftovers in the fridge for dinner, firewood is stacked on the porch, the Tampa Bay Buccaneers are in the playoffs, and I’m at my desk writing.

Winter is life’s way of putting us on hold. Minus the elevator music.

Over Winter?

We are so over winter. At least that’s what I am hearing from almost everyone I know, and plenty of people I don’t. People are tired of the cold, the gray, the wet, and in my little neck of the woods, the snow that just keeps coming.

But what if winter isn’t done with us yet?

It’s been a long winter.

What, I wonder, is preparing to grow?

What, I wonder, needs a little more time in order to be ready to flourish?

What, I wonder, will show itself, if we are willing to wait but a little longer?

Whatever it is, I’ll bet it’s worth the wait.

The Game Plan

Every year we have an annual family gathering at our home at the base of Mt. Adams. Known affectionately as Rodeo Weekend, it takes place over the Father’s Day weekend, and is anchored by the Glenwood Ketchum Kaff Rodeo. On the professional rodeo circuit, this event is a big deal for our little town, as is this big yearly get-together for our not-so-little family. From the babies to the elders, for three days we all come together and navigate the dynamics du jour including sleeping arrangements, nap schedules, food and drink, KP duty, conversations, relationship patterns, political and personality differences, and deeply shared values and convictions. It is our favorite weekend of the year, we wouldn’t miss it, it just keeps getting better, and, as happens in families, such times have the potential to bring out the best, and of course, the not-so-best in any of us.

Cue the Game Plan.

In professional football, to prepare for each new game a specific plan is created. This game plan serves to leverage strengths, mitigate for known liabilities, protect against injury, and achieve a successful outcome. Along with the right strategies, a good game plan includes ongoing communication, clarification, and adjustment, and when all is said and done, the team comes out stronger, wiser, and more connected. Family gatherings are no different.

Cue the Game Plan.

We all come together carrying with us our strengths and weaknesses, and uniformed in our endearing qualities and irritating quirks. Old dynamics find new circumstances in which to play out, and there is unlimited potential for the deepening or damaging of relationships.

Cue the Game Plan.

This year, along with three new babies and another year full of individual and shared triumphs, trials, and tragedies, into the mix comes Gracie-the-chocolate-labraodoodle. Tom and I only mildly jokingly refer to her as our Therapy Dog because she continues to shine a light on the areas of our relationship that still need tweaking. In order to come out the other side of Rodeo Weekend even more in love than we are now, will require that we up our game even more when it comes to how to handle Gracie in the midst of the wonderful family mayhem. Her challenge is to find her inner-calm when around people and other dogs, but left to her own devices she will whip herself up into a happy-but-hot mess every time. Not a successful outcome. When it comes to helping her in that arena, we don’t always see it quite the same way.

Cue the Game Plan.

We haven’t come up with it yet, but it is in the works, and will mean coming up with a strategy that we agree on in both principle and practice. Easy to say ahead of time, hard to do in real time. Our game plan will serve to leverage our strengths, mitigate for our liabilities, protect our relationship from injury, and achieve a successful outcome. It will take ongoing communication, clarification, and adjustments along the way, and if we play it right, when all is said and done, because of a good game plan, we will come out stronger, wiser, and more connected.

When preparing for a football game or a family gathering, ending up with a successful outcome begins with a good game plan.

Rodeo Weekend 2019?

Game on!