On the Third Day of December

Close to 15 years ago I was working in the kitchen of our home in Ecuador and overheard the following conversation from the living room:

Child: When Mom and Dad die, I want the Nativity scene. I'm the only son.

Another child: No way, I get the Nativity scene. I'm the eldest.

Yet another child: Why should you guys get it? I'm the youngest. I want it.

I laugh about this every year when I put out the hand-carved walnut creche. Good memories. Thus, to avoid squabbles after we are gone, before leaving Ecuador, we gifted each child with their very own hand-carved creche. 

Which still doesn't solve the problem of what will happen to it after we are gone. But then, I really won't care, will I?
 
 

I mark the days of Advent on my grown-up girl's Advent Calendar, set in the front entrance.

This morning, on the Gladsome Lights blog, I read this poem. Then I copied it into my journal. Now I share it with you to ponder. 

The Bright Field

I have seen the sun break through

to illuminate a small field

for a while, and gone my way

and forgotten it. But that was the pearl

of great price, the one field that had

the treasure in it. I realize now

that I must give all that I have

to possess it. Life is not hurrying

on to a receding future, nor hankering after

an imagined past. It is the turning

aside like Moses to the miracle

of the lit bush, to a brightness

that seemed as transitory as your youth

once, but is the eternity that awaits you.

R. S. Thomas (1913-2000) Welsh poet