Spring with the wood stove still going

Even though I spent the majority of the winter in Brazil and Cambodia, the coming of spring - these beautiful icons - still moved me to my core. The teasingly warm days and the melting of snow don't have to have been preceded by months and months of frigid weather and heavy layers and boots in order to be exciting and lovely. I guess it's just the way our genes are expressed. I'll always say that summer is my favorite season but spring touches my heart more. It makes me breathe and sigh and expand.

We live up in "The Hills" and drive down into the woods and cross a small stream to get to the house. It's always 10 degrees (F) cooler here than at the nearest grocery store. After 19 years I still dress too warmly in March, April, May. The crocuses, tulips, lilacs are all a week behind "The Valley". As I drive, the season constantly bounces back and forth as the trees in the nearby city, where I work, are already doffing their blooms while new daffodils are still blooming behind our house.

The weatherpeople have been predicting rain for weeks and it looks like this is the week it's here. The saturated sky seems to reflect the new green - it's like the tint's been pushed down almost too far! Grey steam plumes out of warmed wooded valleys. The heavy rains push over the daffodils but water all the annuals and new herbs we put in the garden yesterday. The thinning of lettuces in our garden ought to find their way onto our plates by the end of the week.

The rain keeps me in and makes me think. My life is changing once again. At this moment it's not predictable - not like tulips follow daffodils and daffodils follow snow drops and snow drops push up through the snow. It's more like I'm designing a new form and trying to find the allies that can help build it.