Fresh start

I have posted on this blog at least once a month since 2013. But this winter, I hit a dry spell. I hit the wall. I had a number of ideas for blog posts, but the gravity of my mood kept bearing them to the ground before they could get from my brain to my fingers through the keyboard and out onto the Internet. 

I don't know about you, but I found this past winter extremely demoralizing. 

Between Trump and the rhetoric of division, constant reports of war and oppression, more symptoms of ongoing environmental collapse – ugh – it felt heavy. It felt horrible. 

It felt like the winter of "why bother"? And worse still "Why connect"? I could feel my circle shrink. Social media lost its appeal. For a couple of months, work and Netflix owned my soul. I wanted so desperately to escape.

• • •

And now here comes spring, both literally and metaphorically. 

For better and for worse, humans have an aptitude for bouncing back. Surprise, surprise, again and again, we turn out to be resilient enough for our lives, for this world and all of the ways in which we distort and devastate it. "Oh, so this is the way it is going to be now," we say to ourselves as we begin to adapt to whatever: the horrible news, heartbreak, health problems, loss of loved ones or work or money, and/or a deluge of loved ones, of work and money, healing, falling in love, exciting news – whatever the change, challenge or circumstance, no matter how hard it knocks us down, shocks us, knocks the wind from our sails, we struggle back to our feet and try – try to figure it out, to adjust, to decide: "What next? What now?"

Seeds sprouting on my window sill.
(In my low-rent toilet paper roll "jiffy pots".)

• • •

I biked to the Farmer's Market last Thursday.

It was snowing.

The world smelled the way it does when there is a summer rainstorm – you know that scent? It's unusual here at this time of year.

I wondered if there was a word for it and discovered there is: 

Petrichor (/ˈpɛtrᵻkɔər/) is the earthy scent produced when rain falls on dry soil. The word is constructed from Greek πέτρα petra, meaning "stone", and ἰχώρ īchōr, the fluid that flows in the veins of the gods in Greek mythology. (Wikipedia). 

Isn't that an amazing word (and concept)? The life energy of the gods falls upon stone. And creates a scent that is evocative and thrilling, that wakes us up to our passion and potential.

I feel it everywhere now. It's in the return of the sun, the flowers, the osprey. 

Shy daffodil.

It is the return of hope. 

Welcome back. 

Let's do wonderful things together.