Keeping the Smoke Hole Open

Dear Members of The Waldorf School of Santa Barbara Community,

Renowned writer and teacher Martin Shaw said, "In Siberian myth, when you want to hurt someone, you crawl into their tent and close the smoke hole. That way, God can’t see them. Close the smoke hole and you break connection to the divine world: mountains, rivers, trees. Close the smoke hole and we become mad. Close the smoke hole and we are possessed by ourselves and only ourselves. Close the smoke hole and you have only your neurosis for company."

Here at The Waldorf School of Santa Barbara we do our best to keep the smoke hole open. We work to keep the children in touch with the divinity of things ("All things," said Thales, early Greek mathematician and philosopher, "are full of Gods"), in touch with this good actual world, in touch with the Beauty. And today our Advent Spiral Walk helped us do just that.

The Advent Spiral Walk is a ceremony wherein each child, carrying an apple with an unlit beeswax candle inside, walks a spiral of evergreen branches while live music is played. When the child reaches the middle of the spiral, she lights her unlit candle with the large burning one waiting in the spiral’s center; then the child retraces her steps outward, placing her lighted candle down along the spiral’s way. As each child kindles her candle, slowly but surely the darkness in the hushed, harp-filled Great Room grows less dark, and soon all are awash in a glow.

The Advent Spiral Walk is practiced in most Waldorf schools near Winter Solstice, a time when many festivals celebrate the gradual return of longer days. To see each student walking the spiral in her own manner -- some jokey and light, some measured and proud, others nervous and tentative -- is an experience words fail. But the observer is doubtlessly filled up, defenseless before that particular human being on her particular journey towards her particular light.

Please support WSSB as we keep the smoke hole open and help the children journey towards their particular light by giving money to our Annual Campaign. Our goal this year is $60,000 with 100% school-wide participation (parents, faculty/staff, and board). An amount equal to one month’s tuition is the recommended gift. If that is too much, give what you can. Remember that fundraising covers 10% of our total budget, bridging the gap between revenue and expenses.

Click here now to show support for your community (and thank you to those who have already given!):

https://waldorfsantabarbara.org/annual-giving-fund

With gratitude,

The WSSB Admin Team

PS The thought of the day is by Pema Chodron:

"The warrior's cry is: 'We are needed.' We make this journey for the sake of ourselves, our loved ones, our enemies, and everybody else. Since we all share the same planet, it's crazy to continue acting in ways that will destroy it.

May we all learn that pain is not the end of the journey, and neither is delight. We can hold them both -- indeed hold it all -- at the same time, remembering that everything in these quixotic, unpredictable, unsettled and unsettling, exhilarating and heart-stirring times is a doorway to awakening in a sacred world."