Daily Devotion:

Title: Town Time

Date: December 11, 2012

When the winter ice is glass smooth or close enough to perfect and safely thick, every skater in town, young to old, frolics on the longest pond on weekend afternoons. Figure skaters with dexterity turn leaps at speed, with spins for pleasure, entertaining those of lesser facility.

A civil game of hockey is played pad-less, with players ages 6 to 68; no one is ever hurt, not badly anyway. When a child or anyone much less skilled than you has possession of the puck, allowances are given.  Plays are made; goals are scored. Who cares who wins, so long as the game is fun?

A log fire burns on the ice to warm the fingers and toes of frozen children who take time from whirling around with freedom on blades of steel, whizzing with speed undreamt. Moms and dads tow brightly bundled toddlers in sleds, while skating siblings tag along. Pre-teen girls zip off in bunches with giggles, stop to talk, then zoom again. If any child falls on the ice, any able adult, or neighborly teen, rushes to the rescue.

Such a town-wide skating time is rarer now, but back a few years there were weeks when townies and visitors cavorted on the ice, and found fun and friendship in the red-cheeked joy of being neighbors.

Let’s Pray: Dear God of ponds, children, adults, and dogs, thanks for the times when we are worry free while whirling with neighbors in a town we love. Let us be together in fun times, so we can be there in hard times. Amen.

Here’s a Thought: Neighborliness produces community.