The Candle In My Window

I’ve always felt the peace of light and the people it represents.

In our church, we use candles a lot as representations of ourselves (light a candle to take our place when we can’t stay), as well as to indicate the presence of God.

In our homes, a softly-burning scented candle brings a calmness to our personal space, the enclosure in which we live.

A candle in the window has always meant “someone’s home, someone’s here, there is life in these walls.”

I’m at the top of our hill, in a small apartment house where the only lighting is on the street and from various windows around us. But in my second-story perch, I have a round porthole, finished in white, where an electric candle will fit nicely with its lamp just one-third up.

There are no buildings within a 180-degree range to block it, except for a dorm residence some hundred or so feet away. It is ideally placed to say, “Here is life, here is someone; never think you are alone.”

It reminds me of the aids to navigation we relied on when on the water. “Here is safety; here are lights to bring you home safely.”