Clarion Call

It's truly spring again, even though it's a grey, rainy, blustery day.  Outside my study window a big blackbird has commandeered the birdfeeder, and is struggling to keep his balance on a perch far too small for him.  The wind's knocking over empty garbage cans and flipping umbrellas inside-out.  Oh yes, spring is here. 

Every year I hear people complain that we don't get spring in these here parts.  According to the people who make such claims - and there are a lot of them - the seasons change from winter right into summer, with no spring in-between.  And if there is a spring, it lasts a couple of weeks, or days.
Well, I have news for all you folks, what you see out there, from the vernal equinox right up until the summer solstice, is the season we call spring.  Sure, some of it may seem like winter for the first month following the equinox, and there are days, weeks even, which feel summery as early as mid-May.  But that's how spring comes to this part of the world, and always has.  It's not an even, upward arc of sunny days and warmer weather until the summer solstice.  It's up and down all the way to the end, just like life.  All life.
Who says spring is supposed to look like the images that show up when you google spring?  Spring is the most gradual and subtle of the four seasons.  Spring is the first sighting of a green shoot peeking up through last year's fallen leaves, and seeing that same shoot covered by a light dusting of snow the next day.  Spring is spying the first robin who's arrived a bit too early, but toughs out the lingering winter weather to feed on the worm-laden, wet earth of late April.  Spring is mud and puddles and heavy rains.  It's overflowing city drains and woodland riverbanks, and worms escaping flooded ground to crawl across slippery sidewalks.  It's the barely-there first buds on bushes and trees that only those folks who are looking can see.
Most of the time spring is a season that's not in your face.  It's a slow, sure process of growth and rebirth.  There are, of course, spectacular days of sunshine, comforting warmth, and fresh, fragrant foliage in a myriad of pastel colours.  But those are the peak days of spring.  Since when is a season supposed to be at its peak to have legitimately arrived?
Spring makes its appearance modestly.  Most people don't see it coming.  But spring does its sneaky, subtle thing right under our noses, until one day even the dullest and most unobservant of folk declare that spring is finally here, or arrived too late, or not happened at all because it's summer already. Up until then they complain about what a lousy spring we're having.  In the meantime, they walk by or right on top of tiny miracles growing beneath their feet.
Spring clears debris and decay and unearths natural treasures.  Life reborn and renewed.  And it's happening all the time.  To be a part of it all and enjoy life unfold you just have to stop for a moment, breathe, and be still.  That's how it works for me, anyway.
Blessed be.
- G.P.