“We come from the land of the ice and snow … from the Midnight Michigan Sun where the hot springs flow…”
The Winter Solstice arrived in the early Monday morning darkness, the time when winter descends and light pales. I’ve enjoyed winters here since my return to Michigan almost ten years ago now, and even more appreciate the teaching that I learned out West, to remember that Winter for our ancestors was in many ways a time of scarcity, a hungry time, a dangerous time, so much so that people counted their age not by years but by how many winters they survived. People wintered in small groups, spreading out the demand on the land. “In wintertime, all life is on that knife’s edge between life and death,” noted Dr. Robin Kimmerer, the Director for the Center for Native Peoples and the Environment at the SUNY college of environmental science and Forestry. “Winter is a teacher of vulnerability.” As we face the next few months, with so much seeming darkness on the surface of the world brought out by the pandemic, perhaps we can take on the challenge in a Good Way, and face it like the unbuffered winters of our ancestors.
The great irony of Winter of course is that the moment darkness is greatest is also the moment light is about to return. Each year the solstice comes with the promise the next day will be brighter. And in a year that stripped life for so many os us to bare fundamentals, the natural world became our shared story, and here an ever-unfolding story of success and safety as well as healing, for many. The seasons, especially the brutally stark and majestic ones, offer us the rare reminder that the world moves on, that as mortal creatures of the earth we need food and shelter and a renewed sense of community. However you handled Monday’s Winter ritual of darkness, maybe you were like members of a family of old who would get together and share the warmth of the wisdom and knowledge gathered for hundreds of thousands of years and retold in the darkness of Winter. Or perhaps you, too, looked to the clear, cold Winter sky, this year taking in the rare, 800-year Christmas star conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn. Apparently the last "observable" time the two planets lit up the night sky as a light this bright was almost 800 years ago, in 1226, when Genghis Khan was taking over parts of Russia and the 5th Crusade was trying to capture land in Egypt.
We didn’t offer a Winter Solstice Event or Annual Aho Ho Ho Down this year given the times, but did gather for Ceremony in December. Here’s what Elise had to say regarding her weekend stay: “I recently visited Higher Haven for the Way of the Contrary Retreat. It was an overnight meditation retreat with Inipi Ceremony, and it was an impactful reset for me that was exactly what I was in need of. Higher Haven lodging and grounds are beautiful and comfortable. The food was delicious and I could sense the thoughtfulness in each part of the experience. Paul was an inspiring and positive guide who imparted his wisdom and held space in a very open and inviting way. My connection to his teachings, the nature I was surrounded by and the sense of re-connection to myself left me feeling energized and invigorated. I will definitely be back.” We’ll be back as well, in late February, with our Winter Noble Silence Meditation Retreat Weekend, with this retreat already half-full, like the proverbial glass, and more 2021 retreats and Ceremonial offerings up at the start of January. Until then, look for some upcoming Holiday posts and several notes from The Road. Toksha