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| The Physics of Christmas Love |
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| By Kenneth L. Pierce |
I am from a large family of nine children and have three children of my own. I have many fond Christmas memories of my childhood and my children’s childhood. It has usually been a magical time reminding me that in spite of everything, somebody out there loves me. At the same time however, it has also become a time to remember who is not here with me to celebrate Christmas. So really mixed emotions prevail.
There is a law of physics, discovered by Albert Einstein I believe, which states that “matter and energy are constant”, they can neither be created nor destroyed, they can only change form. In fact, the PEI Department of Agriculture uses this law in its promotional material on clean water, saying that we cannot either create or destroy water, only change its form from a liquid, to a gas [steam, mist] or to a solid [ice, snow].
At Christmas time with its ice and snow, I am reminded of the people whose love I have lost in my life, the people who have died or moved away or even drifted away. If we truly are part of this universe then this “matter and energy are constant” law of physics must apply to us also. Then this would suggest that there may be another way to view these “apparent” losses in our life.
I was the fourth oldest my parents’ large family. Being the “sickly” one, I received lots of attention. So much so that even as an adult, I used to say that I had this magic number. It was 657-5496. I could call this number anytime of the day or night and the person who picked up the phone would listen to me and offer me unconditional love with no strings attached. I suspect most of us have had that experience at some point in our lives, if only for a few minutes. Some of us only feel that way around our pets. But others experience it more often with significant others, whether they be spouses, friends, neighbors and yes, even strangers sometimes. When my father passed away several years ago, I still had my mother to answer that phone when I called the magic number. However, when she died, I experienced an immediate loss, an immediate gap.
But if this law of physics does apply to us then it would suggest that the love that I had received from my parents didn’t disappear but rather it just changed form, like water does from water to steam. When I thought about it from this perspective I recalled at my mother’s funeral how I suddenly started noticing my sister Rosemary and how she treated me. It was as if she stepped right in to offer me her love in a way that my parents had done for all of my earlier life. The more I thought about it the more I noticed that this same process has been happening to me for as long as I can remember. Maybe we are always loved; it is just the form of love that changes.
My maternal grandmother, Nellie Pearl Ayles, lived with our family for many years and our whole clan felt very close to her. She was a very small woman who had a wonderful sense of humor and a “ditty” on the tip of her tongue that she was always willing to share. When she passed away in 1976, I attended her funeral deeply upset. At her wake, I noticed my brothers Glen and Ray both had the “Ayles” chin. Also my sister Joanne was telling stories about Nan Ayles, mimicking her gestures, her sayings and her humor. It was then I realized that Nan Ayles’ love would always be around in some form in somebody. All I had to do was go look for it and appreciate her love in a new form.
Several years ago when I was doing some work in China, I found myself getting homesick. One morning as I was presenting to a class of Chinese colleagues with whom I had been working over the past several days, I noticed as I looked around how much each of them reminded me of family and friends that I had at home. One woman named Xiang looked and acted so much like my sister Mary that at one point I caught myself almost calling her by my sister’s name. It was comforting for me to realize that there is love all around us if only we notice it. It may not be in the form we have been used to but still it is there. Maybe we are always loved at every second of our lives, if only we look for it. Maybe this constancy of love is actually responsible for our evolution as a species.
So now at this Christmas time, when I have occasion to remember and miss my father, my mother, my grandmother and other important people in my life, I see the snow and am reminded that their love is still all around me in other forms, if only I look for it. It is in the love offered to me by those around me now. And perhaps it is what really drives me forward each day to live a purposeful life.
So, as you notice all the ice and snow that puts a frosting on us here in Canada each winter, I hope you will start noticing how it can also represent the various forms of love that are all around you at this time of year. It has been said that “All is love, the rest is just illusion”. Maybe that is so, eh?
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