Spring

Here in Minnesota, spring has been teasing us--playing a little game of catch and release. We've had a couple of balmy, sunny days that have awakened our senses to the freshness of spring air and promised us the hope of an end to winter. But then we've fallen into bed after hours full of mud puddle parades and happy laughter, only to wake again to a white blanket covering our mud pies and lawn chairs. It's a dance the seasons do every year, but for some reason that doesn't make it easier to wait out.

Yesterday was one of the sunny days. I got my kids up from their naps and we marched our selves out the door. I set up a chair, grabbed a book and relaxed while my kids joyfully played around me. It's funny, something about the end of winter puts life right back in your veins. Don't get me wrong, there is magic in the winter season. I love the first snowfall, or even a nice big blizzard: you know the kind where you huddle up in doors under a warm wool blanket with a cup of cocoa and your loved ones. But something about the winter grows long up here. Something about having to hide out within four walls that makes you feel trapped and overwhelmed.

That's why yesterday when the sun was shining, I felt so renewed. That's what the word spring means, by the way. Renewal. As I sat in that chair and looked up at the sky I was awestruck by the beauty I saw. There was a moment where the sun disappeared behind the most billowy clouds. And as the sun was hidden from view, I saw those gilded clouds speeding past. They were teasing me with the strands of the great light they were hiding. Then when at last the sun re-emerged, it burst forward almost animately. I felt it's warmth rush over me. If I was a photographer, I definitely would have captured that moment with my lens. In fact, I wish I was, because it was a beautiful sight. But, since I am a writer I do my best to capture it with my words.

There was something in that moment that reminded me of the process we go through every year with this inevitable transition from winter to spring. It's impactful, as evidenced by the hundreds of statuses on Facebook, the tweets and the blog posts about the seasons change. There are winters in our lives. I realize that's not an original idea-- I know that it's been said and I'm not attempting to present it as a unique impression. But our lives have winters, don't they? Seasons where we feel cold. We feel hidden. We feel trapped. We feel buried under the proverbial snow of circumstance. In those seasons, the clouds around us almost entirely hide the sun. We look up and all we see is darkness and we feel is cold and the absence of clarity, warmth and light. But if we looked closer, perhaps we could see the rushing of those clouds. Perhaps we would notice the gilded outlines that promise there is hope just past their edges. And though winter can be long, and the cold can cut deeply, that moment when the sun reappears... it's a moment that bowls you right over. It releases you in a blinding instant and as it's warmth covers you and its hope engulfs you, there is no doubt that cloud is gone.

Spring is teasing us. And maybe it'll arrive for good very soon, or maybe it won't. But the moments when the sun breaks out from the clouds have to be enough to give us hope. To keep us going. And to remind us, that behind every cloud, the sun is shining; that for every winter, there is a spring.