Christmas Thoughts

I try to imagine what living in Jerusalem must be like right now. Being there with all those different kinds of people feeling SO strongly about the city for totally different reasons and being caught in those emotional riptides running down the streets and having it all be trumped by the majesty of the presence of the city and the the history it holds. I would like to think that I would be educated and humbled everyday by the amplitude that the people there live their lives and practiced their faith. How could anyone living is such a city do any different?

I would imagine that I would keenly watch the women there. I can see them hurrying up and down the streets with their respective loads for their respective households and practically hearing the running list of things to do and see to before tomorrow and seeing that grace that is always in an honest and hard working woman's eyes. My eyes would soften a bit if I saw a woman with child. I'd stop for a second and turn my eyes to the ground when she walked by hoping she wouldn't see me welling up.

I would be more attuned to the sound of a fussing baby or the sight of an open horse's stall. The incense coming out of doorways I was passing would wake up images of Solomon's temple and the synagouges that pepper the city. I would catch different refrains of prayers being sung in different languages but all equal in fervor.

I would wonder at every cobble stone I stood on.

Was he here? Did he stand here? Did someone he loved stand here? Where they here when they saw the star? Did it move them to pray? To sing? Did they see a woman with child earlier that day that made them wonder?

Someone was here and someone saw and for a moment everyone heard a baby cry.

Let Earth receiver her King.

Merry Christmas