Whenever I face something new and challenging, I turn to the Holy Mother. I hold my clear-quartz rosary to my heart, and rising Mother light blesses me and those for whom I pray. I press the smooth, round coldness to count mantras, and she opens my mind to receive what I must know.

Today, as I ask what to expect in 2021, the answer comes with a shaft of pure white light, just as it did during my wedding day many decades ago. I held my crystal rosary then, blessed by my teacher, upon a pearl-white prayer book, gifted by my father. Light blazed above at the precise moment of agreement to a most karmic energy and legal contract.

Holy Mother made her magnificent appearance, and the photographer captured it on film. She stood above us just as the minister pronounced the words, “As long as you both shall love,” as if to say that although this was a marriage made in heaven, it was to balance a heavy load between us. And I had yet to learn other ways of clearing such karma.