Seasons

I love living in a place where the seasons change.  In each season, I find something to look forward to and to enjoy. 

In the summer, I look forward to flip flops and pool days. As a teenager, I lived my life in the guard chair watching over swimmers as they played in the sun.  In the fall, I look forward to the crisp autumn air and the color bursts of the leaves.  As a teacher, I loved the beginning of the school year, the return to routine and the promise of new students.  In the winter, I look forward to the first snowfall.  The first really big snowfall.  One that covers all the trees and blankets the world in quiet stillness.  In the spring, I look forward to the awakening of the world.  We have woods behind our house and I love looking out and watching as the trees start waking up from their winter slumber.  First the lower level of our annoying and yet pretty honeysuckle trees, then the taller locust trees that fill our backyard with their tall trunks and spotty shade. 

Every spring, I am always struck at how much our lives resemble the seasons.  Sometimes, we are living in a summer experience.  Happy, laid back and loving life.  Other times, we are bursting with colors so vibrant that others around us take notice.  And sometimes, we are in a dark, dull winter.  Wondering if spring will ever come.  But it always does.  No matter how hard the winter days are, spring always comes.  Slowly but with confidence the flowers push up the hard dirt, the grass begins to get greener and the birds return to nest and begin new life.  Sometimes, we have to experience the winters in our lives to recognize the awakening of spring. 

This is me.  Choosing to wake up.  Choosing to come alive after a dark winter.  Pushing up through the dirt and becoming something colorful.  Something alive.

Taking Flight

I am a better version of myself when I am writing.  It doesn't matter if I am writing a journal entry, a letter to a friend, a book or a to-do list.  I was made to express myself through the written word.  I am a more honest person when I write.  If you get a note from me, know that you are getting a bigger piece of my heart than you would be getting if we were talking face to face. 

I have found my journals to be a cranky place to be lately.  My entries are filled with the same complaints and frustrations that I found myself writing about a year ago.  So, I am taking flight with this blog.  Jumping way out of my comfort zone in an attempt to witness some forward motion in my life.  I am not sure if anything I have to say will make any difference to anyone but me, and I am thinking I might be ok with that. 

Like a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis, I am testing my wings here.  We will see what happens.