Wrapping My Soul
The Wine: Lo-Calorie/Sugar/Alcohol Pinot Grigio (COVID Correction)
The Winery: La West Liquor & Market, Claremont, CA (COVID Connection)
The W(H)ine: Wrapping My Soul (COVID Conviction)
So, I wrapped no presents this holiday, only my soul in sweet surrender.
2020.
The year of Pandemic, Pandemonium, Politics, Protests and Pajamas. Some suffered additional challenges. Like job or relationship loss. Cancelled holidays and Holy Days, and Loved ones passing away, agonizingly alone.
How? Do We? Recover.
This new year, in the absence of social stimulation, I am Wrapping My Soul in Rest. What better gift might we give ourselves from a year that has wracked our well-being? The year of cancel culture, negative narcissism, and regulatory resetting… If you did not hit some form of Rock Bottom in 2020…this past two weeks (outside of Cleveland Browns glorious post-season victory) prompts profound perturbation, does it not?
How? Do We? Rest. When my five then-needy children ran about underfoot, ages one to seven, I oft found myself swinging my apron over my head during dinner prep, lifting a silent prayer to the Universe, combined with a deep breath, beckoning a moment’s soul-Rest, amidst all the familial chaos. I would stand still, and just Be. Just a moment of not-doing, not-striving.
Just Be-ing. Wrapping my Soul in Rest. It worked. Then. And now. Whether you find yourself alone during these isolated times, as I do. Or confined uninterrupted with children, comrades, or colleagues due to Covid confinements and corporate conditions (God bless the first responders, second responders, and all who struggle without any solid sense of “normal.”) The crazed circumstances offer us opportunity for calculated pause. Might you spend a moment of surrendered silence before ordering your day, and your household, and your staff? I found myself single, sad, and solely responsible for any and all activities over the long, lonely holidays for the first time in forty-nine years. F(*&. Without a boss, employee, child, professor, parent, partner, client or colleague to order my next move.
Without expectation from a soul. Without.
In the silence, I struggled. In the emptiness, I emoted. In the quiet, I quit. I quit doing, striving. I quieted my quickened mind. I searched a sullied Soul. And wrapped myself in Rest. My brother texted at the New Year, “May the unforeseen of 2020 carry us into the unknown of 2021 with trepidation, curiosity and respect for What Is.” What Is. The world clamors for our attention, no matter how small or large your influence. Whether progeny pout for homeschool relief, or dictators demand global domination, what IS beckons.
Be Still, Soul.
Be Quiet, Self.
Just BE.
Would you wrap your soul in sweet surrender to a moment’s peace with me? I promise you the world’s wonkiness will wait for your return. And when you DO, you will BE restored to respond from a place of Rest.