Excerpt from THE STILLNESS OF WINTER by Barbara Mahany

November 9, 2020 | By Women Writers Women Books | Reply More

From the front pages of The Chicago Tribune and her revered page-two columns to her sought-after blog, Pull Up a Chair, Barbara Mahany has shared stories of her family’s life that have drawn in thousands of readers for decades.

In her new elegantly illustrated gift book, THE STILLNESS OF WINTER: Sacred Blessings of the Season (Abingdon Press Hardcover; October 6, 2020; $19.99), Barbara ponders why we are drawn to the season of winter and what wisdoms can be gleaned from this season of the longest night.

Says Mahany, “Consider this a field guide to wonder, certainly, and wisdom, perhaps. It borrows, in spirit, from the almanac, the scrapbook, scribbled field notes, assorted jottings, and, on occasion, the banged-up recipe file that’s tucked on my kitchen shelf. It’s a book I hope you come to know as something of a friend, a gentle-souled companion you might choose to cozy up with.”

We are delighted to feature an excerpt from her book.

BEING STILL, pp. 38 – 39

Curious thing this December, more than ever, it is the stillness that speaks to me. That I seek. That some days I grope toward as if blind and making my way through the woods on nothing more than the steadiness of my footsteps and the fine-grained whorl of my fingertips rubbing up against the underbrush, telling me I’ve lost my way.

It is as if the deep dark stillness itself is divining me toward home.

Which, of course, it is. It always is.

Oh, there’s noise all right this December. Clanging like a cymbal in my ear, the squawking from the news box, the screeching of the brakes.

But I am—in my best moments—pushing it away.

I take it in in stiff long drinks—the news, the noise, the grave distractions—but then I do odd things: I lift the blinds at night so I can watch the snowflakes tumbling. I wind the clock and listen to its mesmerizing tick and tock. I sit, nose pressed to frosty pane of glass, and watch the scarlet papa cardinal peck at berries on the bough.

I am practicing the art of being still.

Stillness, when you look for it, is never far away, and not too hard to grasp.

I find, though, it takes a dose of concentration. And sometimes a stern reminder; I mumble to myself, “Be still now.”

I am dropping to my knees, or curling up in bed with incantations on my lips. They carry me to sleep some nights; what better lullaby?

It is, in fact, the heart, the soul, that are the vessels of pure true stillness: those chambers deep inside us that allow for the holy to unfold. The birthing rooms, perhaps, of our most essential stirrings.

To be at one with all that matters. To begin the pulse-beat there where the quiet settles in and the knowing reigns.

It is, yes, in the stillness that the sacred comes.

—

ABOUT BARBARA MAHANY:

Author and journalist Barbara Mahany writes about stumbling on the sacred amid the cacophony of the modern-day domestic melee for publications, including The New York Times Book Review, America magazine, The Los Angeles Times, and more.

For 30 years, she was a writer at the Chicago Tribune, and before that a pediatric oncology nurse at Children’s Memorial Hospital. Her first book, Slowing Time: Seeing the Sacred Outside Your Kitchen Door, was named by Publishers Weekly as one of their Top 10 religion books for Fall 2014. She and her husband, the Tribune‘s Pulitzer Prize-winning architecture critic, Blair Kamin, have two sons. For further information regarding Barbara Mahany, visit: BarbaraMahany.com.

@BarbaraMahany (Twitter)

@BarbaraMahanyAuthor (Facebook)

@Barbara.Ann.Mahany (Instagram)

THE STILLNESS OF WINTER

Winter is the coldest time of the year. The days are shorter, and the nights are longer. Deciduous trees are bare of leaves, and some animals hibernate. Christmas is celebrated, one year comes to an end, and a new year begins.

In The Stillness of Winter, nationally known journalist and author Barbara Mahany unfurls month by month the winter season exploring the natural world to find the holy within and the holy all around during this sacred season. Expanding on content from Barbara’s book Slowing Time, this beautiful two-color gift book is part almanac, scrapbook, field notes, and recipe box, showing readers how to experience the winter world around them with joy and curiosity.