There is a picture hanging on our living room wall of my mother and her sister. They are giggling like two, young school girls. Their Shantz family humour is evident in the conspiratorial way that they are leaning into each other and in the touch of mischief in their eyes. Mom is in her mid-seventies, Aunt Edna in her mid-eighties at the time of the photo. They are chortling over a joke in a birthday card that they didn’t quite get which then only served to escalate their laughter even more. The joy in the moment is palpable.
Fifteen years later, I took another photo. It is on another summer day, another Sunday, sitting out back at Old Stone Road having lunch. Mom’s head is thrown back in a full-out laugh. In her upheld hands, she holds a butter knife (inscribed with the words “lay it on thick”) and a cob of corn with a dollop of butter sitting on its kernels. Those hands would often reflexively cover her mouth when she smiled or laughed to aid her expression of happiness after Bell’s Palsy left the one side of her face permanently altered. But in this moment, her hands were occupied with the important task of slathering her corn-on-the-cob with butter, so her face was open, and there was true abandon in the effusive joy on her face.
Joy. A Sunday school song that we used to sing when I was a girl had that title.
J-O-Y
J-O-Y
J-O-Y must be
Jesus first, Yourself last, and Others in between.
This little ditty was supposed to be a recipe for Joy, but to be honest it felt more like a prescription for resentment. I get the sentiment, and as a child I tried really hard to follow the script. What I did not know was that in order to put others before your self, you have to have a somewhat developed sense of your self. In my childlike earnestness, I leap-frogged over my own self in a way that took some repair work years down the road. The Y in JOY was lost and JOY became JO. Disentangling the Y from the prescriptive formulas of a taught faith and learning instead to knit the Y in with faith, that the Y actually belongs, was transformative in and of itself. Therein, in fact, may lie a measure of genuine JOY.
“Joy is a deeper emotion than happiness that comes from within — from a sense of purpose and meaning, including finding meaning in suffering — and from relationships with others. It therefore lasts longer than its counterpart. It’s also relatively independent from happiness … Joy is internal and connected to living a more authentic life. This is because to have joy, you must do inner work, identifying your values and strengths and aligning your life with them” (Katherine Atherton). This description of joy unwraps the depth to which joy can be present in our lives. Joy is also listed as a fruit connected to the Spirit, and the metaphor of fruit suggests a long, slow, nurtured process.
I felt something of a sparkle of joy this Advent season in the book “The Best Christmas Pageant Ever” by Barbara Robinson. Having heard that a movie was released based on this book, I had a vague recollection of purchasing it years ago at a second-hand store. Searching my shelves, I found the slim, red and gold cover and read the short work. It was written in the seventies and tells with whimsy and humour a story of how a town’s classic Christmas play was upended and refreshed by a motley crew of kids. Told from a child’s uncluttered perspective, it brings an awareness of how our stories can be heard anew when they’re set free from the prescribed scripts. The reading evoked both laughter and tears.
Joy is more than a bauble we hang on a tree, more than a shape for our cookies, but hanging ornaments on greenery or baking Christmas favourites may in fact stir up joy. While a cookie-cutter faith has potential to tarnish the luster of joy, a faith that takes shape in authenticity may foster joy. Remembering my mother with her sister or looking at the photo of Mom with her undiluted, uninhibited expression of pure joy, corncob in hand, reminds me that joy can bring a long-lasting effect. As the poet, Mary Oliver, pens in the last line of her piece “Don’t Hesitate” – Joy is not made to be a crumb.
Joy. Lighting a candle for joy.
