Hope then Departure

"Quietly you say to me,

the time has come for you to be alive again."

When I walk past the Tulip tree this season, it's the same story over and again.

Every year our Tulip tree comes to bloom too soon. Too soon? Sure, Mother Nature sends her mixed signals of warm, spring-like temperatures and then she lets Old Man Winter have one final raspy gasp and ruins all the beautiful pink blossoms. If the tree were just once allowed to come out in it all its full glory, the smell is just indescribable. It fills the street. Our neighbors leave their windows open just to enjoy it.
I hope that the tree gets to its full glory, but more often than not, the sudden cold turns those white and pink flowers to brown.

Hope. That's what fills me every spring. It is unstoppable and irresistible. It's as if the earth comes forth with such power that we are carried away with it whether we are ready or not. Spring is the starting point. The springboard for everything anew.

It's the best season really. Everything begins again. Despite our faults, shortcomings, ragged and dusty souls, we are forgiven and redemption is ours. The better part of our natures comes alive as well. It's a short period before the lazy chaos of summer.

It always stirs deep memories for me as well. Bittersweet memories of a college love affair long ago. Painful memories of my grandmother passing. I even remember having one really crappy 12th birthday when a kid picked on me. But also carefree times of growing up in rural Pennsylvania. Happier and much simpler.

I feel intoxicated by it all. But intoxication never lasts. And that's spring.

Then, yesterday, a cold slap. The snow came down, about 3 inches of it and transformed the world. Surreal and cruel.

I will post pictures.