Winter's long sleep is reaching the twilight hour before the dawn, when we're not even sure if there is a change happening, except ... except ... the geese have returned. The trees - still leafless and silent - are budding. Female mourning doves are returning, and the males waiting for them have taken to billing and trying to chase them down one at a time. The daylight lingers just a little bit longer. Rain melts away snowbanks - imperceptibly at first, then more noticeably as the earth awakens. The grass - if it shows at all - is still brown and wilted, but as if by magic, gradually appears green moss and the first stirrings of the lichen that will eventually bear the muted purple tones of heather.
Those who know me best know that I hate winter: the cold, the piercing damp wind, the lack of light, the ice and slippery footing, the bulky clothing, and how it feels like it never seems to end. Every year, though my head knows it will, my heart wonders if it will EVER end.
This morning, a snowbank, which had stubbornly persisted the last two months outside our picture window, was suddenly gone after a soaking drizzle kept at it all night. Beneath it, I was surprised to see tiny one-inch sprigs of green: thin sword-like leaves bearing, in a place or two, another layer of foliage that had a tinge of purple to it, a promise of a bud soon to form. "Crocus," I breathed, noting my own sudden, internal sprig of ... what was it? happiness? Hope? I couldn't quite tell which it was...
A few feet away, like tiny rolled up cones of forest green paper, tulip plants were sprouting from beneath the mixture of soil and wet maple leaves from last fall, half-decomposed maple leaves I had forgotten were there until the snowbank was gone. They were about three inches above the soil, so I realized that they had been slowly growing beneath the snowbank - and with the rain, the snowbank slowly rolled back like a heavy velvet curtain at a live theater performance.
I stayed at my position in the window, kneeling on an armchair with my nose pressed up against the glass, for a few minutes. I drank in the sight, reveling in the tiny slivers of color, until my knees told the rest of me that it was time to get back on my feet. Yet, a few times throughout the day, I have returned to my perch to check and see whether the buds have shown any sign of maturing. My soul needs this gentle, delicate whisper of promise, a distant echo of God's own rich voice. Too long my soul has just been "hanging on" waiting for better times, for more daylight moments in which to soak in nourishment as the leaves soak in the sun's rays. It is as if my soul has joined the Earth in its trip around the sun; it is now in a better position to benefit from the warmth that was always there all along.
I, like the Earth, the plants, the birds, the trees, and the grass, am waking up. Winter is finally giving way - even if only a little - to the persistent hopefulness of spring. The longer, darker nights are shortening. I am more aware of the Light. It is good; He is good.
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| Photo "Blooming Snowdrops In The Spring" courtesy of radnatt at www.freedigitalphotos.net |
This morning, a snowbank, which had stubbornly persisted the last two months outside our picture window, was suddenly gone after a soaking drizzle kept at it all night. Beneath it, I was surprised to see tiny one-inch sprigs of green: thin sword-like leaves bearing, in a place or two, another layer of foliage that had a tinge of purple to it, a promise of a bud soon to form. "Crocus," I breathed, noting my own sudden, internal sprig of ... what was it? happiness? Hope? I couldn't quite tell which it was...
A few feet away, like tiny rolled up cones of forest green paper, tulip plants were sprouting from beneath the mixture of soil and wet maple leaves from last fall, half-decomposed maple leaves I had forgotten were there until the snowbank was gone. They were about three inches above the soil, so I realized that they had been slowly growing beneath the snowbank - and with the rain, the snowbank slowly rolled back like a heavy velvet curtain at a live theater performance.
I stayed at my position in the window, kneeling on an armchair with my nose pressed up against the glass, for a few minutes. I drank in the sight, reveling in the tiny slivers of color, until my knees told the rest of me that it was time to get back on my feet. Yet, a few times throughout the day, I have returned to my perch to check and see whether the buds have shown any sign of maturing. My soul needs this gentle, delicate whisper of promise, a distant echo of God's own rich voice. Too long my soul has just been "hanging on" waiting for better times, for more daylight moments in which to soak in nourishment as the leaves soak in the sun's rays. It is as if my soul has joined the Earth in its trip around the sun; it is now in a better position to benefit from the warmth that was always there all along.
I, like the Earth, the plants, the birds, the trees, and the grass, am waking up. Winter is finally giving way - even if only a little - to the persistent hopefulness of spring. The longer, darker nights are shortening. I am more aware of the Light. It is good; He is good.
