Shadow Puppet Storyteller

The Epiphany

Christmas Day without the human element -- one might think would be a lesson in nothing special happens on a day where no person is involved. However, some mornings, when i have allowed myself the time and space to wake totally naturally and with maybe only an activity a little more than an hour away (just enough anticipation to keep moving toward a something), my true self gets to be outside the humanness and experience some cosmic truth in the stillness and quiet of the morning.

This woman indulging in a morning shower begins to feel as the parched earth feels when desert showers pour down. Any water needed deep in will have to pool for a while, and any resulting mud may cause long-stuck deposits to finally be pushed in directions they have been previously unable to move willfully.

Because it is Christmas morning, a sliver of a carol drifts into consciousness, and having been on a strict diet, limiting Christmas carol intake, at first the line feels meaningless. Due to hearing a sermon four days earlier, specifically examining all allegorical elements of the early drama in the Christ child's birth, an idea connects with this line. if the Virgin and the christ child represent a new idea, an unthought-of idea finally being given its moment of illumination in the physical world, then it is quickly in danger of being denied, or even squashed out of existence by the status quo, the law, or the Roman ruler Herod, who represents the current reigning thought one holds too.

So, call me crazy, but I was enjoying a Christmas carol by realizing its bookmark utility for this moment. It had long infiltrated my brain by being around every year of my life in Christmas tradition, but now, it was drawing my attention to its own absurdity. I'd been analyzing music a lot this year, having become less impressed with what songs say accurately, and instead realizing the artistry is in how words are cobbled together to make the right sound to catch in our brains.

A story, perhaps every heroic story is a teaching tool, perhaps playing to the lowest common denominator. We learn from drama, not always seeing the Truth otherwise. I have grown just a little today by realizing that our creative attempts to explain the spiritual are necessary until we can believe without the use of human or demi-human heroes substituting for ideas.

Yes, the reason for the season is Christ, but that does not mean it is all about a person named Jesus, savior born as a babe to a virgin mother, which we are told to cherish. This Christmas story explains so much more. Are we always to be taught with the same story, is there a way more can awaken and see? Holy, holy holy is the day faith and understanding are joined.