Coming from a girl who has always favoured the deep hues of leaves about to make their descent from their birthlands of the branch, over the sun-burnished tones of summer grass, the depth of anticipation that I am feeling as spring makes a late entrance into my life is something of a suprise.
I sit here with tea and porridge on our breakfast table and find myself drawn to the written word as nourishment as opposed to the meal in front of me. I can see that the long-lived Albertan snow has all but vanished; the space behind the house is once again the green space that we signed up to see along with the lease and the blanketed white glow is leaving. And I am more than happy.
There has always mean a magic about Autumn- the change of winds from warm, enveloping breeze to chilly whirls of gold and red and green. I love it unconditionally.Fall, to me, is everything that a season should be....cosy but calm, devoid of manic weather, occassionally allowing lukewarm, fat droplets of rain to nurture the earth but providing me with the opportunity to wrap myself tight in the comforting fabrics that make me feel protected and content.
Winter, with it's first meadows of snow and icy cobwebs also makes for a happy Sian. I got married within a whisper of christmas day, my husband and I exchanging vows in a tree-adorned church with Christmas Carol accompaniment. But the thrill of winter has been beaten not out of me but down; snow, the Big Freeze, foggy breath is romance personified in December and to me, this will never change. But in April, it's a drag. On motivation if nothing else. And now it has gone and a renewed ambition for the year comes with the buds that the frost can no longer keep from shooting through with defiance.
The Hallmark holidays have altered from the desperate pleas of Valentines Day, an occassion to lift the spirits in the midst of lingering chill, to the bunnies, post-lent goodies, sprouting daffodils and green of Easter. In faith, my background of Catholicism, spring heralds a resurrection of Spirit. Yes, I'm looking out of my window on this above 0 degree Monday in April and I feel an acsent of Spirit.
Today, I will inevitably have a fabulous day. I am listening to music, my porridge is warm and waiting, my little ones are full of their first meal of the day and they play together with the warm glow of morning sunshine pouring over them through the window. I shall never be so blazé about the onset of Spring again. I'll remember this day forever as the moment that I understood why God made the world with Evergreen as well as Tulips. For the same reason that he made every creature in the world with it's own personality:
It takes all sorts to make the world go round.
