Michelle L. Rusk's Blog, page 7

Meet the Hostess and Take Everywhere Bags in this week's video

Closing Doors, Opening New Doors

It’s so easy to keep doors open, believing that what we want will eventually come through them. And yet we also wonder if it’s time to close them because we’re keeping other doors from opening. I believe this is also more challenging when we’ve been working hard and don’t feel that we’ve created enough momentum to close the door and take a chance that something will happen.

With the change of the calendar, I might be more aware of this than usual. I’ve had several things I’ve been trying to make happen– usually involving other people which always seems to be the reason they don’t happen and why I’m always hesitant to take on projects that involve others– and no matter how much I try, they aren’t moving forward.

Yet I don’t want to close the doors because I’ve invested not just time and money, but some of myself into these projects as well. I’m also sensing that it’s better to let go, that maybe I’m keeping other doors from opening. I’ve started to make steps to closing the doors– not outright announcing they are shut, but putting things away that are related to those projects and, quite honestly, putting them out of my mind.

Sometimes with a “soft close”– letting go– things do come back. And if they don’t, one day I’ll run across something relating to them and see it’s time to shut those doors for good because I’ll be too busy with something new, something that came along because I let those doors shut so new ones could open.

A New Sweater Dress, My Books, and Dogs Antics

Looking for Light in the Darkness

January is the longest, darkest month for me every year. I’m grateful that so far it’s gone fast (although I struggle with how fast time seems to be going) because February is short and then March appears.

The good news is that by the end of January, we gain over thirty minutes of daylight back.

I realize that there are many people for whom it’s not just January that is a struggle, but the feeling of constant darkness is all the time. It could be the longest day of the year and for them it still feels dark.

That said, I do believe that all of us need to go through some darkness. I’m not wishing anything bad on any of us, more that to move forward, we have to experience darkness. It’s only then that we have a greater appreciation of the light. In the same way, as much as I hate winter the cold months, I believe that plants need to die and hibernate to come back stronger in the spring. Winter should be a time of rest for all of us.

If we are experiencing darkness, then it’s up to us to find a way to not just endure that time, but make the most of it. I think of January as a good time to clean out closets, organize things I haven’t had a chance to in the previous year, and tackle projects that keep us indoors (a good time to make a quilt! or two).

Everything looks different in the dark. I know that well- when I wake up in the middle of the night and can’t stop thinking about whatever I’m worried about, often what bothers me then looks different once the sun goes up.

Make use of this time. After all, as someone once told me, the sun has to come up eventually. Winter has to give way to spring. And cold has to be replaced with warmth.

First Video of the New Year

Looking Back, Moving Forward 2024

My dad died on January 1, 2006. We often joked that he knew some sort of tax/financial reason to hold onto the first day into the new year before he died. But it makes it difficult to pass into the new year without recognizing the profound loss that it is, the death of one’s parent, and the reflection of what that means in my life as I travel into a new year.

Several times as the new year approached, I saw a quote that said we shouldn’t make resolutions to change ourselves, instead our resolutions should be to be ourselves.

I don’t think resolutions are about that sort of change- about not being who we are– so much as they are about making our lives better, especially when it comes to mental and physical health. And about making our time on this earth more meaningful.

Still, this got me thinking about my dad and his discomfort in who he was. The very discomfort that kept an open beer can near him as much as possible. I didn’t understand it then, but in the years after he died I began to see how challenging life had been for him, how disappointed he was by it. And how he didn’t seem to ever feel comfortable in his own skin.

There are stories from other people that reflect these gleanings and I believe that when he drank, although he wasn’t a nice person, he felt that he could reside in his own skin.

While thinking about all of this regarding my dad, I also returned to some reflections about my own life and the challenges I have faced being the person I know I am supposed to be, the person that I am. And the difficult road that has been to continue to walk when around me there is constant noise and distraction to change, to be trendy. To be something I am not.

Perhaps I have tried to walk this road because I didn’t want to be unhappy like my dad. But I won’t profess this road has been easy. It’s been quite the challenge to hold steady when I’m pulled in directions I know aren’t right, that won’t last, that might bring me something quickly, but that the light will burn out just as fast.

I always like to take the changing of the calendar to see what I can change for the new year, what closets I can clean out, what I can make more meaningful. But this year I’m also more aware of this path that is mine, that I continue to walk steadily on, knowing it’s the right path. And somehow I need to keep forging ahead.

Merry Christmas from Chelle Summer

Advent

It’s hard to believe that it’s already the third week, the pink week, of Advent. For me, probably because of Chelle Summer, my life is more hectic at this time of year than it used to be, making it a bigger challenge to not lose sight of what it means especially because it only comes once a year.

Advent obviously a much happier journey than that of Lent, one about sacrifice (although I always try to make it about finding a way to grow closer to God which might not be about sacrificing something). Advent is about the light, about the joy ahead, and with my birthday falling on the same day as the feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, it’s also about a time of year when I feel closest to God.

I wrote last week that things happen to me this time of year and it’s like I must be closer to God because I can hear him better. But I also believe that Advent is a time of looking back and looking forward.

It’s the end of the year so we are reflecting on everything that happened this year. And we are also starting to look forward to the new year, to what lies ahead, and what we’d like next year to be. That great joy from the season, from Christmas, is what propels us into the new year.

And gives us hope for the future. Merry Christmas, everyone.

The Holiday Party Tour

Guadalupe's Reminders

I will fully admit I was wrapped up in party prep on Saturday when Fr. Gene called. We meet every few months at the abbey for my spiritual direction and I figured he wanted to move our appointment because he found out he had something else scheduled at that time.

Instead, he said, “I’m going to my homily on Tuesday about you without naming you. It’s about how a Polish woman from Chicago became devoted to Our Lady of Guadalupe.”

Tomorrow, December 12, is both the feast day of Our Lady of Guadalupe and my birthday.

He asked me to recount how it all began and I found myself…. not remembering.

But as I began to piece the details together, maybe not all of them, but the ones that came to me, I was reminded how Guadalupe always appears around the time of my birthday. As I told Fr. Gene, “Things happen.”

I admit I was a bit tired on Saturday. While I was excited for the party, It also has been quite a six weeks or so of events and happenings. I’m near the finish line now, but there are still things to do before the break really comes.

As I kept talking, something occurred to me that I don’t remember thinking before– that Guadalupe is behind my creativity.

When I go to church, I always light at candle at her statue and ask for her help, guiding and leading me in both my writing and my prayer life. Fr. Gene had told me once that God speaks to me through Guadalupe and I joke that I don’t hear God so he figured out that was the way to reach me.

Since becoming aware of the presence of Guadalupe in my life in the last ten or so years, my creativity and inspiration have increased and feel endless. Now the challenge has been how to balance finding the time to be creative with the realities of making money and keeping the bills paid.

But on Saturday none of that mattered. She just wanted me to remember that she is here with me, that December is the time I feel closest to her and God even though they are never away. In December, I take the time to reflect on where we have come in the past year. And what’s ahead.