I’m not totally sure what to make of this recent Plough essay by Clare Coffey, but I know that I like a lot of it.  In the piece, Coffey tries to tackle the weird “vibe” that takes us through autumn, from Halloween through Thanksgiving, then from Advent to Christmas.  She begins her look at “spooky season” by talking about a couple of different approaches to traversing the time (either as “stickler badgers” or as “jolly hedgehogs”).  And then she talks some about the history of how people have understood the time (and how it shows up in songs and stories).  It’s a fun, colorful read, even if the colors are more muted than the bright colors of summer.

While the whole article is worth a read, here’s how she brings it to a close:

Christmas still bears some traces that mark its closure of the spooky season. There’ll be scary ghost stories / and tales of the glories of Christmases long long ago, goes the song. And the most beloved piece of Christmas literature outside of scripture is in fact a ghost story. But as the bright lights twinkle through the season, any memory of shadows and hauntings dissipate into merriment, let the cold bite as it may.

That’s as it should be. Spooky season is almost over. Christmas is coming to kill it, thanks be to God. But for a few weeks more, I will indulge in the gloom and doom, the left hand of salvation history, before the lights go up.

This Sunday is the first Sunday of Advent, which for many begins with the lighting of one candle.  Bit by bit, light by light, for sure.  This piece is a good reminder of that.