Expectation

Expectation. I remember as a child that wonderful feeling. This time of year everything seemed magical. I remember how every Christmas preparation was laced with excitement...paper chains, Christmas lights decorating strange places in our bedrooms (i.e., curtain rods), the careful setting out of the fine porcelain manger scene. On the four Sundays preceding Christmas, my family would gather in the dark, light the Advent wreath, eat Little Debbie Christmas Tree Cakes (one of God's great gifts to mankind), drink hot cocoa, and breathe in the Expectation of Something Big Coming. Someone Coming. And then, on Christmas Eve, when each of my siblings and I were literally bursting with excitement (because Everything was beginning), we would have our Christmas meal, open our ornaments from our parents, and try not to light ourselves on fire (because one year, it happened...shout out to you, Mom. Be wary of cute holiday decor that involves attaching small candles to dinner plates). The fifth candle was lit, the room was no longer dark. We all demanded to sleep in the same room (until I was too Old to do this...such a sad Susan moment). We lit a candle, snuggled up, and fell asleep well after midnight. And the next morning (read five hours later), much to my parents' yearly chagrin, we would run wildly through the house, wake said parents up, be told sternly to return to bed until it was 6 AM, chatter excitedly and obediently in our beds, and then...Expectation Fulfilled. Stockings bursting, parents sleepy, children bright-eyed, treasure-hunting, package-ripping, laugher-making fulfillment.

Expectation. That wonderful child-like sense of wonder, of trust, that what you expect will be as grand as you hope. I remember when my child-like wonder gave way to the reality that Christmas was just another day, followed by more days. Regular ones. It was so hard for me to grow up, so heartbreaking. Even now, the memory is sad. Because the wonder seemed to have gone forever.  These days, now that I am Mature (insert wild laughter here), I see that Wonder can be found again. Flashes of joy are all around. But they are flashes, not beams. And I see that that is ok. Watching Mac get giddily excited at the sight of the Christmas tree...Flash. A visit to a town that fulfills all Christmas fantasies...Flash. The uneven cobblestones, a mug of hot Glühwein warming soul and hands, the sight of variating medieval stone comprising buildings, walls, streets ...Flash. The first snowfall of the season. Pine boughs gilded with snow stacked row after row on the hill across from my house. Flash. Flash.

As we left Rothenburg (the oh-so-perfect town mentioned above), a lady in a store wished me a lovely Advent season. And I've been thinking on that since. She didn't say "Merry Christmas" as I did. No, she wished a lovely season of Expectation. Not the culmination, the waiting. I'm sure she didn't mean it to be quite so laden with meaning. Christmas here in Germany isn't so much about the day as it is about a season, stretching from Advent to the Feast of the Epiphany on January 6th, with much more observance and respect for the religious aspect of the holiday. (We are trying to incorporate this into our family life...Christmas as a season focused on the church holy days instead of one day). But I took two things away from that exchange. One, I think I may start wishing people a lovely Advent season...that is, after all, the season we are currently in. It isn't Christmas yet. And two, as we wait here in the Dark, as each week the candles are progressively lit, as simple flashes of joy crop up here and there, I need to be reminded that my greatest Expectation has been fulfilled. That all these flashes are just a foretaste of what will come. That Darkness has been banished, chains have been loosed, redemption has been accomplished. The Light is come.

And so, I wish you a season of great Expectation. Flashes of joy all 'round. 

'til next time.