wrappings

wrapping packages is something i absolutely love.  seeing their colors and shapes beneath the tree is eye candy for me, even though the simplicity of brown paper and twine or ribbon remains my favorite.  this green holly paper shown above serves as a family wrapping tradition.  i doubt many families have one, but we do.  back in the 1940's & 50's, my grandparents owned a music and camera shop in what was  then the small town of barstow, california.  according to my mom, they had huge rolls of this very paper for wrapping gifts in the shop.  after my grandparents sold the store and moved to idaho, my grandma kept one of those giant rolls and would wrap a gift or two in it each year.  everyone looked forward to see who would receive a package wrapped in "the paper".  even after my grandmother passed away, my mom kept the remnants.  this christmas (some 50 years after the shop was sold), i received a package wrapped in this sweet family tradition.  wanting the paper to last, i captured it with my camera.

our token

HONEY

Several times a year the women at my church gather for "Women at the Well", a Saturday set aside to meet with each other and the LORD.  There is space and quiet, something difficult to carve out on our own and even together.  There is always one in December- the busiest month- an advent focus to just simply stop and listen.

Tara talked about honey, among other things, about the fact that John the Baptist found sweetness in the desert.  She mentioned the fact that honey is mentioned some 40 times in the Old Testament, but only 4 in the New.  Twice in John and twice in Revelation.  Perhaps this is because the One who is sweetness had finally arrived in our midst.  

And she brought us honey, raw and local, and encouraged us to dip some out of the jar...to observe it, play in it, taste it.

From that arose these thoughts of mine...

Hungering for Honey

Oh so heavy and slow is the waiting.
Purifying- yes, though at times I feel raw.
Sweetness promised at the tip of the
spoon, but the winter is long and the honey cold.
 
I see it golden and light-filled in the jar- 

full of sweet promise.  I see the spoon dipped deep,
then swallowed by the devouring substance.
Finally the spoon emerges, swollen with the bees’           

labor, and I know it will slide onto me.
I just don’t know when….
But I walk away with sticky fingers.

December 11, 2010 

Women at the Well