The Two Most Beautiful Things

Last September, my husband and I spent a gorgeous week in Nuremberg. While we were there, I picked up a weekly calendar with 53 postcards, called Weisheiten 2019 (Wisdom 2019). Each page consists of a picture postcard and a wisdom quote.

So this year, I'm going to blog once a week, using these prompts.

"The two most beautiful things are the home from which we come, and the home to which we hike."

Well, I don't do much hiking, but I love returning, both to my own home, and to my parents' home. Especially at special times, like Christmas, Easter and family birthdays. This Christmas, my daughter and her fiancé came home on Christmas Eve and stayed for three days, returning to their home on the 27th. And we all travelled over to Worcestershire on Boxing Day, which my mother insists on calling 'Christmas Day Two', to spend time with the extended family. It was a time of warmth and love and sharing, for which I am grateful still.

Because I know that Christmas is not an easy time for many - for those who have lost their parents, or are alienated from their families, or have been uprooted from their homes (for whatever reason), or have no home to go to, or come from. For all these, Christmas is a time to be got through somehow, endured with gritted teeth.

And I am reminded, as always at this time of year, of the wise words of Howard Thurman:

When the song of the angels is stilled,
when the star in the sky is gone,
when the kings and princes are home,
when the shepherds are back with their flocks,
the work of Christmas begins;
to find the lost,
to heal the broken,
to feed the hungry,
to release the prisoner,
to rebuild the nations,
to bring peace among the people,
to make music in the heart.

Let us live to make it so.