receiving the gift with open hands...

"Gratitude" suggests Kisha James, a member of the Aquinnah Wampanoag tribe in New England, "is how we embrace beauty without clutching it so tightly that we strangle it."

To receive life as a gift is to acknowledge that we do not — and indeed cannot — hold our world together out of our sheer effort, will and strength. Most of the best things in life can only be received and held with open hands. (NYTimes)

About three inches of fresh, powdery snow fell on our retreat home today: the wind is blowing vigorously, the fire is now blazing, and the sky is a uniform gray preventing any sense of direction. Setting off for an artisan Christmas fair, we chose not to go up the mountain given road conditions and the possibility of freezing. Instead, we wandered the back roads for a spell before winding up at one of our favorite Benedictine monasteries. "Apparently," Di noted, "we needed to make pilgrimage." That felt right to me, too. In addition to an Advent candle for my evening prayer live-streaming tomorrow at 4 pm and some monk-made fresh cheese, we found a children's interfaith book that will become part of our grandchildren's Massachusetts library.

There is something meditative about watching the snow fall against pine trees, expansive dairy farms, and an opaque horizon. It is a gift that can only be recognized and then received with open hands. Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer puts it like this in her poem: "Belonging."

And if it’s true we are alone,
we are alone together,
the way blades of grass
are alone, but exist as a field.
Sometimes I feel it,
the green fuse that ignites us,
the wild thrum that unites us,
an inner hum that reminds us
of our shared humanity.
Just as thirty-five trillion
red blood cells join in one body
to become one blood.
Just as one hundred thirty-six thousand
notes make up one symphony.
Alone as we are, our small voices
weave into the one big conversation.
Our actions are essential
to the one infinite story of what it is
to be alive. When we feel alone,
we belong to the grand communion
of those who sometimes feel alone—
we are the dust, the dust that hopes,
a rising of dust, a thrill of dust,
the dust that dances in the light
with all other dust, the dust
that makes the world.