December 24 Christmas Eve flows warmly into December 25 Christmas Day, 2005 at Stanford Memorial Church. Midnight Mass is cool and the night is balmy. Incense brings it all back for me. Hard to explain but I spent many hours in church at St. Bonaventure in Allegany NY. Serene quiet hours in my best dresses and shiny shoes, performing ritual motions and emotions automatically, while my mind spun off elsewhere. Eventually, I followed it.
Party at my house Friday night December 23, 2005, so I get to sleep in. Saturday night we go to church to sing and pray and listen to a choir and tenor soloist with harpist accompanying. The church is lovely and crowded. My mom does not know why I am there, but mostly it is about her. My mom, my dad, and my aunty. I do what the rest of my family do; I pray, for what it is worth. I told C that we were banking some important religious parenting points that I rarely bring to the table.
The priest said we would feel better about ourselves by the time we left the service. He was right. But maybe not in exactly the way he anticipated. How could he have known what breaking out the special, classic incense would do for me. That was a rare rush. Worth doing it again next year but I would like to arrive earlier, to have more quiet time for meditation. That place inspires deep thoughts. Or is it the soft clink clinking sound of the incense burner chiming against its long chain. OM (AM/PM/OM)
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