Looking for the Extraordinary Within the Ordinary

It’s Boxing Day. Our family Christmas Day went really well. We exchanged wonderful presents – socks, books, games, puzzles… We enjoyed an excellent Christmas dinner – turkey, sprouts, bread sauce, trifle… All was great – it was a lovely day… similar to our Christmases in previous years, similar to other families across the country.

What made it extra-special for us were the people – the laughter, the love, the conversations – the mutual care, concern and support. It’s the people who transform the mundane, unremarkable and ordinary into the personal, memorable and extraordinary.

I guess that’s what the Christmas story is all about. The birth of a baby to a couple in an obscure town is pretty ordinary, but having that birth announced by angels, claiming that he’s God. in a baby’s body, is pretty extraordinary.

After the family had left us last night we watched ‘Call the Midwife’. Set in poor areas of the East End of London we enjoyed the usual nuns, nurses and regular characters. Last night as the midwives delivered two babies it struck me again how to most folks the birth of these babies was unimportant, inconsequential, ordinary. To the families concerned, whatever their financial or social status, these babies were special, vital, extraordinary.

One of the lessons I’ve learnt this year… I am still learning… is that within ordinary children is extraordinary wisdom, within ordinary older folks is extraordinary experience and character, within the sick and the weak can be found extraordinary strength, within the loud and the brash can be found extraordinary compassion.

This week, between Christmas and New Year, is traditionally the time when we consider our New Year’s resolutions. Perhaps mine this year might be, ‘To look for the extraordinary within the ordinary’… I will need to reflect further on the care, determination, joy, gratitude and creativity required, and pray for God’s help to find it.