I start the week with a broken range.  Locked out of stove top and oven because of a suspected short in the control panel, I can’t create with ingredients.  No dinner making. No holiday baking. No soups, chili, stew, cornbread, or greens.

My reliance on Wegman’s shifts from produce to prepared-right-there aisles.

If I shift my exasperation to the side a bit, I can see the promise of this week of waiting for the repair person.

Instead of gathering flour, sugar, and butter, I can gather pine cones, pine boughs, and glue gun.  Wreaths and swags can emerge from my hands, and I am still able to move into the season of advent, a time of re-grounding and renewal as I watch the sun move to its most southern point in my afternoon sky.

The promise of the sun returning, the days lengthening, fuels my hope for peace and inspiration.

The promise of hope.

From a broken range.