FLAT.

I am sixty-two this week. Last Sunday, to be precise. Earlier last week when my husband and I were ruminating how to celebrate this milestone, I got a slight ache in my lower back. No big deal, I have occasional sciatica and know when to take a good ol Tylenol or ibuprofen.

As my natal anniversary approached, the ache accelerated its intensity. Like a responsible adult, I ignored it; lifted grandkids, schlepped Christmas trees, reached for things too far away because I was too lazy (or sore) to stand up, padoodling on like nothing at all was happening to my sacroiliac ligament, merrily rowing my boat down the tumbling River of Denial into the falls below.

By Sunday morning I knew that the place I really really wanted to spend my birthday was anywhere a competent doctor could immediately prescribe pain meds and muscle relaxants. So that’s what we did. Much hobbling ensued. Many unpleasant, unfeminine grunts. Some minor profanity. Some slow perambulations from the car to the clinic. Really slow.

It’s Thursday now. I am still on a steroid, prescription pain meds, Tylenol and the occasional gin and tonic. Don’t judge, they’re delicious and I’m not driving.

On Monday and Tuesday, the only position in which I could get some relief was flat on my back. So for roughly 48 hours, with short, painful potty breaks and a dinner break each evening, I was examining the intricate laciness of the dust swirls on our bedroom ceiling fan. I really should clean up there. It’s an archeological site.

I also slept a lot. I mean, a LOT.

Wednesday I was better, but still moving around like a stoned 99 year old orangutan. I think you can imagine that if you close your eyes a moment. There. There it is.

There’s a lyric of singer Paul Simon that comes to mind, “I should be depressed, my life’s a mess, but I’ m havin’ a good time...” Although my life is actually far from a mess, my back is doing a good job of trying to get me down. And it has, a bit. I do admit to an occasional teary moment, whether its drug induced or just me, doesn’t really matter.

Getting older does indeed have its drawbacks. (See what I did there? Yuk, yuk, yuk.) But it has its gifts, too.

If my back hadn’t been so awful this week, I would not have seen such abundant evidence of my husband’s love for me. From driving me to urgent care, to getting my prescriptions, making meals, cleaning up, giving me extra back rubs with smelly unguents, and assuring me that I am still a hottie even though I am walking hunched over and using a cane to get myself off the toilet, he has been a champ. If I wasn’t getting out of seated positions with an audible grunt of pain, I would not be so aware of the sheer beauty of being able to effortlessly stand up. I would not have found this extra-large heating pad that can boil your skin in thirty seconds if you’re not careful but ohmygod it’s aaaaaaawwwwwwesome. I would not have experienced the miracle of having nothing on my mind while laying in bed, simply feeling the sheets warm up as I shift to a slightly different position.

I would no doubt be busy decorating the tree, wrapping gifts, attending parties, being useful. All very Christmassy things to do, but not Advent-y ones.

Advent is all about waiting. (Well, that’s what everyone preaches from the pulpits anyway.) But Advent is also about limitations. Limited daylight. Limited understanding of Who is coming and what we’re supposed to do about it. Limited awareness of ourselves, even as we pray for the coming of the Christ into our hearts. Do any of us really know our own hearts, much less how to open them at will? I imagine putting a throne for Jesus in my heart and I think he’s going to have to bend way over to fit in that tiny space. My heart’s on autopilot, and I think a lot of us are the same.

Who among us has not silently gone through their Christmas gift giving list during an Advent sermon? Show of hands, please. Who of us hasn’t wondered how to get invited to that party, or how to graciously uninvite ourselves if we’re feeling overwhelmed and just would rather stay home with a Hallmark Christmas movie? (Take your pick, they all have the same plotline.) How many of us suddenly jolt upright, wondering if we ordered the ham, or just dreamt that we did?

My point is, we are generally terrible at waiting, and even worse at correctly identifying our own limitations. We all want to get into the holiday spirit, but do we actually want to get into an Advent spirit? Probably not, if we’re being honest. Nothing particularly ho-ho-ho about Advent. But there is a level of honesty required to get through it without missing absolutely everything it has to offer.

That’s the kicker here, the real meaning of Advent in big capital letters: HONESTY. Do we really want that? Mostly, no.

And also yes.

Without honesty, we can’t feel the rush of shameful freedom of knowing how much we both love and hate this holiday season for all the chaos it unleashes. Without honesty, we can’t fully accept that we are surrounded with loveable, terrible, beautiful, flawed people who drive us crazy and make us lonely and happy and miserable, horribly human as they break and bind us, even as we do the same to them. Without honesty we’d actually believe each other’s warm and wonderful, absolutely perfect Christmas newsletters, and hate each other all the more for it. Without honesty, Advent doesn’t mean anything, really, except a countdown for your credit card expenses.

This Advent is a season of finding myself flat on my back, with still too much stuff on the calendar and a real doubt that I’ll get it all done. That’s without the backache, too. This Advent is like a polite stranger sitting on the other end of the bench I snagged in the park and I really wish she would get the hint and just leave me alone with my crinkly bagged lunch. But there she is anyway. Waiting.

Here’s what I am going to do. I am going to sit or lay quietly with a heating pad, thinking about the actual perks of being fragile, breakable, and not enough. I’m going to consider the possibility that when Paul said he found strength in his weakness, he wasn’t kidding. I’m going to question the gifts found in what I accomplish and stack them against the gift of needing help. How do they measure? I don’t know. I’m going to assume that it will take me longer to heal my back this time, because I have been given sixty-two amazing years to wear down joints and bones as well as laugh my head off and learn to be stupid and loved and real.

I’m going to wait. Without knowing how it will all turn out this season.

Because really, that can be an incredible gift to be given. Almost as good as a gin and tonic made by my husband.

It can be an incredible gift, I think.

Not having to know.