Sitting Still

a devotional for late winter

Photo by Debby Hudson on Unsplash

a blue-black jay startles, rising
from behind a tree
as the dog runs past, 

and I consider the rush of wings
this season inspires:

the heron shrieking at the pond, 
the duck pair’s rebuke, 
the tiny songbirds searching for a place
to call their own;

this season of tumult,
feathered flurries and harsh calls, 

a prophecy of the way the colors expand
and the heart peals like a bell

when the petals
of the daffodils
sing awake. 

We’re emerging from the Season of Sitting Still, and everything around me is growing restless. The dog paws at the back door three times more often than usual during the day, desperately longing to spend more time outside. The birds flutter from tree to tree, scouting for prime nesting places. I spotted my first mosquito the other day, and some ducks and herons have taken up residence near our pond, fluttering away with a croak and a squawk whenever we go for walks. The freak snowfall from last week is melting, a constant drip drip drip from our gutters and eaves. 

The now and not yet quality of this seasonal threshold feels busy. Too busy. I’m not sure if I’m ready for the tumble and the brightness of spring, and yet I feel the call in my blood to rise and rush and begin. To put winter behind and start. 

It is also Lent, and that matters. Lent is a season of vigil, and a vigil is a purposeful pause. A call to mind where you put your feet, where you choose to sit, where you lay your head. Lent assumes that life is full, and seeps her way in anyway. Lent cannot be ignored, and she certainly won’t be denied. 

Her sister, Advent, waits to be invited in. Lent shows up whether you’re ready or not. 

If the glow of Advent was the glow of the soul’s preparation to receive, the light of Lent is the light of clarity, revealing who we truly are when the tangle of winter gives way to new growth. 

Sometimes that clarity requires sitting still, and sometimes it requires mindful action. The Season of Both/And. Quiet and questing. Pushing and pulling. Ebb and flow. A spiritual borderland. 

These thin places in the year aren’t always comfortable, but they do reveal. And when we emerge out the other side, we’ll be grateful we spent so much time sitting—still or not—with these questions in our laps.

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