Lantern Festival

Tonight is the Lantern Festival, marking the last day of the Spring Festival or Chinese New Year here. It's celebrated in a beautiful array of glowing red lanterns hanging in windows, fireworks and community. As I watched today as people passed by roadside fireworks (they've been almost non stop all week) they were emotionless as if their joy had been sucked into a vacuum. Excitement is a luxury that few here get to enjoy. Because of the amount of people jockeying for the same societal position, joy and wonder have no place. People are walking and doing and producing, but are they LIVING?? Without a hope, these mundane things are what you do. Why waste time on anything else, there's no profit in that.

I sat with a friend on our frozen tundra we call our balcony, cuddled in a blanket having cookies and coffee. She's one of the few who has wonderment still stamped on her soul. She's not a sister to me, but I see awe stirring in her. We 'ooh'ed' and 'ahhh'ed' at the fireworks as they poured through the sky. It was a refreshing time and reminded me that my hope is everything that gives me and others a life to live.