No doubt, there are many blog entries on Keen this week, welcoming spring and wishing one and all a Happy Easter. Although the topic seems cliché and mundane after awhile, I still can’t help but proclaim happy spring and happy Easter myself.

 I live in Southern New England, a spot on Earth that suits me. I can travel 3 hours north and enjoy the mountains. I can travel 45 minutes South or East and enjoy the ocean. I can enjoy city life within an hour’s drive, either Providence or Boston. I can meander west and enjoy rolling farm lands, rivers, and woodlands. Quaint New England charms seem to be everywhere, weathered cape homes, white picturesque churches, picket fences, and aging colonials.

 I also love the four seasons in all their glory in this part of the country.

 March is an interesting and depressing month here. Winter still tries to hold on even though spring has arrived. We vacillate between snow flurries, rain, occasional ice, blustery wind, and that sunny day, temperature hovering in the 40’s, the sun straining to heat the earth. But I can’t help but feel happy and joyful at the sun’s attempt, knowing that changes are occurring, the land is blooming forth, and new beginnings are again possible.

Despite the occasional last few puffs of winter, I’m hearing birds singing in the morning and the sun greets me as I wake. The robins hop over the yard, nesting now, no doubt. I’m seeing the bulbs pop through the ground, tufts of green that sprinkle the brown and gray of the landscape. In two weeks, the recreational fields may open, if the rains hold, and my children will be playing soccer and baseball once again, and within my community, neighbors will begin hanging out on their porches after dinner, and I will be able to wear flip flops, wiggling my toes, while enjoying ice coffees among the tulips, daffodils, forsythia, blooming rhododendrons, and blossoming trees, including my favorite, the weeping cherry.  

Ah yes, I love how spring emerges, sprouts, blooms, explodes in living color, and I am reminded of how beautiful the world can be, even after the darkness.

We are moving, once again, into the Light…the possibilities!