So right after Thanksgiving, I mentioned putting up my Christmas lights. It was a cold night, I remember. And it’s still cold tonight, and half a moon, which may give us hope. Do you have hope of a full moon? And shorter nights? Hope that the light will come and stand again in the center of your life? Yeah, so do I. I believe in spring. Still, soon the timer for my Christmas lights will shut them off, and tomorrow I’ll box them up, put them away, until they’re needed again. And they are, don’t you think? Light is something true for us, something more than pretty.

Today, on the Orthodox Christian calendar, is December 25. Christmas. The Nativity according to the flesh of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. On the “New Calendar,” it’s January 6, Theophany – Holy Epiphany in the West. Either way, Christmas is over, and the 12 days of it that end on Epiphany if you’re into that. And our endurance of the long dark night, which leads to lent, which leads to Pascha (Easter) resumes.

Bring it on. And May will be all the more wonderful.