Transforming the Stillness

Dear Heavenly Father,

This quilt was meant to be our ritual—for us to spend time together and for me to get to know the mountain. Instead, it has turned into something completely different, but isn’t that just your way? Always an answer to my intention, but never answering my expectation.

The sun has been out for weeks, no cloud in sight. The Arctic days are getting longer. I can see a little peek of grass where the snow has melted away, and the sound of local airplane traffic indicates improving weather conditions. I should be out enjoying the spring, but I am not. I’ve closed myself off in the darkest room in my house, where there is only one small north-facing window, quilting in silence.

It may seem like I’m doing nothing more than sitting, but I am cutting, and sewing, and redesigning this material into something more beautiful and more purposeful than it was. Something to wrap myself in, or rather wrap a friend in.

This space has become my cocoon, and I like a caterpillar that is working hard on its transformation, but in complete stillness.

Today is the one full moon cycle anniversary of my funeral. I am no longer searching for other voices. In fact, all other voices have gone away. No television, no books, no podcasts, no phone calls, no music. It's as if I am in my mother’s womb, and time is only measured by the in and out sound of her breath. And the only thing that is happening is the steady growth of life, and the only thing anticipated is the birth of something new.

Father, is not knowing also a form of knowing? I do wonder if knowing the moment without the past or the future at hand is the most authentic kind of knowing. And what good is knowing unless it is also transforming? So, while I may know that I am the mountain, I must transform into that mountain for my divine identity to be authentic.

So, I stay... in the dark, in the silence, in the stillness, yet hard at work on this transformation. Perhaps I shall emerge tonight to celebrate the anniversary and watch again for a moon rising before retreating back to my cocoon.

Does She watch me too? Or, as a mother, does She hold me, and does She wait and transform with me?

Your daughter sincerely,

Emily

Amen.