I think about Mary every day. It’s hard to wake up in a king size bed she bought and not look across the emptiness of it. It’s hard to collapse into that bed before sundown and remember how much easier it was to simply get dinner on the table with her help. It is hard to look at my sons and wonder why they had to lose a mother who loved them completely.
As I push ourselves to new places and heightened experiences, I get these moments in the ashes. The phoenix cycle: mental, physical, and spiritual destruction followed by a bursting forth of power. It gets easier to recognize, but more painful to experience. I wonder if it will ever stop. I wonder if I want it to stop.
The primary course of the hero’s journey is within. To enact that process through ritual in the physical world helps make sense of it. I’ve walked the Labyrinth at Delaware Art Museum dozens of times. I’ve received knowledge and comfort each time. I need those on this Summer Solstice. I’ll have my boys as well as friends of theirs who have lost their father. I’ll have a dear friend on my mind who lost her husband a year ago. I’ll have so much weight when I step to the entrance of the Labyrinth today. I’ll shed it on the path in, I’ll strip myself down to what is good and right and beautiful in Creation. I’ll sit at the center and thank God for His love and this treacherous road that has let me love myself more.
I may be there for a while today.
I’m always lighter on the way out. Maybe I’ll be on my toes. Maybe I’ll skip with my younger son. Maybe I’ll get a devilish smile and dream up some glorious quest to launch. Maybe I’m already on my way there.
God bless and thank you for reading,
Jason