Happy Holidays!

In these days filled with returning light, may we be blessed with a renewed capacity for love, generosity, and hope. 

From year to year, the winter holiday season and its meaning shifts for me. Some of my most moving holiday season memories are of a winter solstice service at the First Parish in Lincoln that ended in a bonfire on a snowy hill, a Christmas eve worship that consisted primarily of singing carols with my family, and a retelling of the nativity story in a small worship led by Harvard Divinity School Unitarian Universalists.

Perhaps what I will remember most about this holiday season is the snowstorm in Boston this past weekend. By Friday, the flakes were falling fast, living out predictions for significant accumulation. On Friday night, Shai, a friend of ours, and I walked 3/4 of a mile to attend a party. At moments it was chaotic; we got lost at first, and it was hard to read the signs through the whiteout of snow, and my face was cold. At other moments, it was beautiful; we found ourselves on a quiet streets where snow seemed to gracefully frame each small house.

When we arrived at the party, there was hot cider, cookies and a hearty group of people. Friends had walked, taken the bus, and even cross-country skied to be there. And this wasn’t a party for a momentous occasion; no fiftieth wedding anniversary, celebration of a child’s birth, or other extraordinary circumstances. It was just the chance to be together, to baking cookies and drinking warm cider and laughing. This was the case with parties we attended the next day as well; it was a significant effort to get to them, but once there we found others had made the same effort to travel through the snow to be together.

On Sunday night, we celebrated the first night of Hannukah. This was my first time hosting a Hannukah celebration, and it came hours after another (!) snowstorm hit Boston. I was worried that at the end of a long weekend of trudging around, with the snow deeper than ever, and with the evening remarkably cold, our guests simply wouldn’t be able to make it. But once again, friends who could do so traveled through the cold, the snow, and the darkness, to be with us as we lit the menorah.

 This holiday season, I’m finding meaning in togetherness. It’s no one story or set of symbols that’s moving my heart, but rather the lived experience of seeking out and finding ways to spend time with family and friends, during the time of year when we have the longest nights and seemingly the coldest days.