It wasn’t in the Christmas Carol when Dickens wrote, “It was the best of times and it was the worst at times,” but maybe it really should’ve been.       .       . I mean, isn’t that really what the holidays bring us?  Our lights don’t always twinkle and certainly our tinsel doesn’t always sparkle, and yet, this season isn’t what we usually find but what finds us, ready or not.  Most often when we grieve, it’s not with all the capital letters it deeply feels like.

So what are we to do this season or any Season and all of the little SEASONS in-because?  Grief is always in the season; it’s not a date on the calendar or a particular time of the year.  It’s not something that we attend or attend to so much as what it does to us and it’s not always a person that we grieve.          .          . Sometimes it’s what we don’t have or what we could’ve had or what we will seemingly never have.     .     .

I don’t know if your lights are twinkling like they always have in the past, but if they aren’t, please be kind with yourself and embrace it; let others put their arms around that which hurts most in you.      .      .

And please don’t be afraid to embrace the Hurt in Another.       .       .

That’s not just surviving a season. It’s thriving in it
B     L         i        n             K     i           N         g
lights or not.