a small sketch from my travel journal
It’s the night of Summer solstice. At home in Seattle the sun is at its highest right now, and hopefully the skies are clear to give the locals some much-onged for warmth during this cold Summer on this, their most treasured day. Here in Copenhagen–which is not yet home—the sun is starting to set, though the light has barely ebbed. Well after ten o’clock I can still read easily in the twilight glow that’s stretching over our high city balcony.
John Mayer is in town, the poet whose blues have sustained me through these strange and wrenching times. I searched for tickets—begged, borrowed and threatened to steal in two languages—but alas, none were to be found. Instead I’m sneaking smokes and playing all the live songs I could download one after another too loudly through the open windows of the living room. Message in Bottle (which I once heard Sting perform on an awkward date in an enormous arena). My Stupid Mouth (The Blogger’s Lament.) 83 (whimsical. nostalgic.) And finally, Gravity, my touchstone, my anchor.
I have been dreading this day, alone and away from my community on one of our most holy days. Paul is at a work party. One which has a reputation for being a bit of an orgy. One to which spouses are not invited. The girls are asleep after what for me was an exhausting night of homemade pizza, sing-a-long movies, and reading aloud extraordinary long chapters of Harry Potter. The grand finale for mom was one of those long, drawn out bedtimes only clever children can create, and enough dishes to make a restaurateur cry. But now that I’m here, alone with the dog, listening to John and watching the swallows dart after invisible insects; I find that I am actually okay in with this solitude, watching the sun slip into sleep, being grateful for the light.
At Stonehenge this morning the sun crested over softly arching hills, struck the blue-hued Heelstone, and drove its light between the arches of the great trilithon. Hundreds were there in dreadlocks and druid robes, smelling of travel and patchouli, trying to name something unnamable, making it up as they go along. Isn’t that what we all do? Cobble something together from shards of history and intuitive pull? Look for the meeting point between what we know and what we hope to be true?
I was at Stonehenge not long ago, fresh from the opulence of Europe’s finest cathedrals, ready to be unimpressed by a ring of stones surrounded by security fencing. I was surprised to find such holiness there, walking in a round where people have paced for thousands of years; waiting for the shard of light to crack the sky; hoping for a life continued. I followed the tour and when I reached the Heelstone, paused to touch its side. As I felt the warmth of the sarsen stone under my hand, I noticed a young woman walking counter clockwise to the organized tour, her shoes in her hand, her feet on holy ground. Seeing her example, I wanted suddenly to sink to my knees. It was all I could to do still my voice, to not incant ‘Holy, Holy, Holy.’ But I was unaccustomed of being a stranger in a strange land for so many long months, worn down from always sticking out, from always being obvious. I did not have the confidence to kneel in front of so many tourists in windbreakers and cameras. (Who knew the bending of the knee could be an act requiring so much strength?) Iinstead I stayed my hand on the stone, leaned my weight into my palm, and let my soul pour out thanks. Gratitude for the light. Gratitude for continuance. Gratitude for all that we need to go on.
It was not, and this is not, the Solstice I have come to remember. It is not the riotous and ridiculous parade; the familiar and homespun pageant built with our own hands; the silly, colorful crowd of thousands. Instead it is a new lesson in holy moments—stumbled upon alone (yet with casts of thousands now past); a mishmash of vices and virtues, of new songs and old stones. I feel as though I am soaking somehow in this history, in this present, and in the sun—always our promise of a future. I am melted. I am melded, somehow, me in this chair alone. And I think—held in this mystery of solitude amidst the companionship of souls—I think as the sun now fades, “Dayenu, it is enough.”
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