I am typing this on an historic day in South Louisiana - it's snowing! And it has been snowing for hours. There must be 3+ inches of it in my yard, and it is still falling - a soft blanket that covers everything, and makes everything beautiful.
There is something strangely comforting and calming about a snowy day. Perhaps it is in the silence with which snow falls and accumulates into piles and drifts - so different from the splashing and pounding of rain. Rain seems to demand our attention - "Listen to me, observe me, fear me", while snow seems to gently whisper - "Watch me, enjoy me, join me".
Odd that today would be the day for the biggest snowfall in South Louisiana since 1895. It is exactly three years since Renee left this earth. God told Job that He had storehouses of snow "reserved...for times of trouble..." What a gift for me - actually, a gift He specifically "reserved" for me for this troubling day.
It has been nearly 9 months since I last found the energy to write in this blog. It's no secret that I have been struggling with grief and loss, searching for something "good" to come out of the losses, the many losses, that seemingly have followed me over the last three years. But today, of all days, there was the snow, the soothing calming, healing snow. And even as I watched and allowed and felt the snow begin to cool the anger and resentment in my spirit, this special gift from a special friend arrived:
There's nothing wrong with tears, is there?
As this day of memory winds to its end, it seems, and I pray, that perhaps my anger and resentment is winding to an end as well. Grief and loss continue; but maybe now it does so in a way that God can use.
All this special day, the words of a poem we all know have been swirling through my mind - words which reflect where I, and maybe others find ourselves. Late this afternoon, I walked out to the street and and took this picture of my neighborhood, which, appropriately for this poem, is named "The Forest":
"Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening", by Robert Frost
Whose woods these are I think I know
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
Ambrose Ramsey | Pastor and Shepherd
