Do you send Christmas cards every year? I admit that I am not consistent at sending cards. I want to send cards, I think about it, and in my mind I plan to send them . . . unfortunately, some years (most years) it falls by the wayside. However, I love and appreciate the cards I receive from others. They are displayed on the buffet so I can enjoy them during the season.

Often, along with the cards, there are Christmas newsletters folded and tucked neatly into the card. Exploits, successes, and vacations are shared—a looking backward at the past year. Recently, friends have started sharing an accounting of the past year’s happenings and adventures on Facebook—along with pictures. And, not just any pictures. Perfect pictures. My life or pictures can’t measure up to what I read or see, but it may depend on how you choose to look at life. This post is my looking backward and forward. 

January is named for the Roman god Janus who is the god of gates and doors—transitions. His image is of two faces, one looking backward and one looking forward. This past year has been a year of transitions for me. Most often, I choose to look forward and not back. However, sometimes looking back helps clarify what going ahead may look like.

Last January I retired from my Music Director/Organist job at a church. I had never imagined that I would retire. Church music was not a job—ministry is who I am. I felt called to minister through music and studied in college with that goal. I served in music ministry for over forty years. However, I did not retire with celebration and finality, rather I simply quit. Covid was a large part of the decision and also the fact that I have had a full time job otherwise for the past seven years. My feelings of not having the time and energy to devote to church music as I would like was a huge part of my decision.

Several months ago my husband and I sold our pipe organ which we have had for twenty-five years. That has seemed sad and strange. It is an effort to downsize for when we may want to move into a smaller house. The empty space looks like a void waiting to be filled with the next chapter in our lives—just like the void of not being a church musician.

With all that said, I have not written as much this past year either. I could not bring myself to really process not being a church musician. For that, I apologize to my regular blog readers.

I have spent much of the year looking backward though. I have wanted to know more about my ancestors. My family did not talk much about their relatives. I knew very little beyond my grandparents. In fact, I had only seen my grandfathers a few times because I was very young when they died.

The PBS TV show Finding Your Roots spurred my interest—therefore, last year was a really long look backward into the past. I found myself researching the various countries, religious groups, and parts of history concerning my ancestors. 

This long look back into their lives provided many insights. One of the shocking, though not surprising, realizations is that women in the past spent most of their lives pregnant or nursing. For example, one of my great-grandmothers had three children born: 1885, 1889, and 1891. She married when she was fourteen, had her first child at seventeen, and she died at age twenty-four. Her mother (my-great-great-grandmother) had seven children born: 1856, 1858, 1860, 1863, 1865, 1868, and 1870. She married at age twenty-one, had her first child at twenty-four, and died at age fifty-four.

Those are not isolated instances, just the first ones I looked up just now. For a modern woman, seeing those numbers is quite sobering. (I will be sharing more information I learned in upcoming blogs.)

I am nearing the finish of my genealogy research. Honestly, it could go on much longer but I am satisfied for now that I have done all I could to find information. Some of the papers are sorted and spread out on top of the harpsichord waiting to be collated into a final book.

All the research made me thankful to be alive in the world we have now. It is certainly not perfect—however, I can enjoy moments in my life and share them in hopes of making others smile, laugh, be creative, think more deeply, or notice moments in their own lives more intensely.

Last week, at breakfast one morning, I noticed how the light shone on some of my favorite pottery pieces. The morning sun created a bright glow on the green hues. It made me stop and savor that moment of beauty. It reminded me that I need to stop and notice even the smallest details. 

Today, January 2, 2023, as I was washing dishes I looked out the window and noticed the green daffodil stems beginning to emerge from the winter soil. Every year they return to remind me that spring will be here soon. While I experience time as linear, perhaps plants realize time is cyclical—seasonal. In the end is always a beginning.

After my long look backwards, I am ready to look forward and move ahead—finding beginnings where things have ended.

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For last year’s words belong to last year’s language
And next year’s words await another voice. 
And to make an end is to make a beginning.

— T. S. Eliot (1888-1965) American poet, essayist, publisher, playwright, literary critic, and editor

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Here’s to more words waiting to be thought, written, and shared . . . from me to you.