Is there a difference...

...between winding down and winding up? The year is winding down to a close, and the day is winding up its last hours. Outside, it is cold and blustery, today's powdery snow swirling under the orange-y streetlamp glow. The children are sleeping, and the husband is out with friends for the night, so I will be ringing in the new year on my own. That's not a problem. I don't know that I have ever done that before,at least, not to my recollection. It thrills me just a bit, truth be told. I get to welcome the fresh year any way I choose. With a song and a dance, with a candle and a prayer, or with a sigh and a dream, already asleep.



Winding down, winding up...has this year been nothing more than an unravelling of hours? I try to remember how I went through it; sometimes striding, sometimes crawling, sometimes tumbling end-over-end, like an empty carton propelled down a sidewalk on a windy day...all the time moving forward, onward. Am I pushed, or am I pulled?

wind down
1. To diminish gradually in energy, intensity, or scope: The party in her head wound down as her best ideas began to leave.
2. To relax; unwind: time to unwind, before the next wave hits

wind up

1. To come or bring to a finish; end: by the time her story wound up; would she ever wind up a project.
2. To put in order; settle: she wound up her affairs before leaving the planet.
3. To arrive in a place or situation after or because of a course of action: she took a long walk and wound up at a place much like where she began...only far later then she had ever expected.




A year can feel like a long trek, or a short flight. It can feel like a series of exuberant leaps or a slow swim through murky waters. This year had a few installments of each. But this year winds down and ends for me with this:

From my last post, a windfall of extraordinary feedback, in form of comments and emails, that have knocked my heart right of its shelf. To all of you who wrote, who thanked me for telling my story, who gave a shout of encouragement and words of compassion, and who shared their own hurt for their children...humble thanks don't even cut it. I don't think I ever would have guessed so many folks would know the bittersweet song I thought I sang alone. Seems many of us know the words and melody too well. But by the same token, the more we reach out to one another, the more the world around us can hear and learn. My heart hopes for this.

From my editor, a letter telling me a story I have written will be published in an upcoming anthology in May 2009 for parents of children with special needs. Any mom can tell you, her kids are a favorite topic, and any writer can tell you, to be chosen for publication is a thrill like none other. Put those things together and it is a heady cocktail indeed. I drink a toast to everyone who encourages me with me writing AND my parenting!

And I wind up starting my new year with these:

A family I love and friends I treasure,
A spiritual path I honor and a natural world that astounds me,
A warm home, good food, good health, hope and humor,
Hands that can make art, and can play drums, and can comfort
Feet that explore and dance
Ears that drink in music and stories
Lips that can speak about all my blessings and sing the blues when need be,
Eyes that take in what each moment offers in order I might better understand,

And a heart that knows what is true:

Love is the only thing not trapped in the hourglass.
May it surround you every day of every year of your life.

Blessed be.