waiting for spring to come

This is the part of winter that just wears me down.  The seemingly endless days of waking up cold, of building fires and getting splinters from the wood and sitting in the morning chill trying to get myself going.  Of mud being tracked everywhere and kids not wanting to be outside, but certainly not wanting to be inside anymore, too.  Of early dark and late light and jackets and boots and mittens and hats.  Of stacks and stacks of blankets, always more blankets, piled on the sleeping kids, and the lingering smell of smoke in our house, our couch, our carpet, our clothes.  Of showers too short to heat through the skin to the body, and timid baby hands and feet that want to crawl and walk and play, but pull back from the icy concrete floor.

I long for the sun to pierce the wind and go straight into my bones.  To seep into every vein and drive out the lethargy of these long months.  To smell the musty earth and feel the soft new grass and fuzzy young leaves that slowly change the brown trees to green.  I want to cut the tall daffodil stalks and bring their bright yellow beauty into my home and be rid of the feeling of gray.  To walk and run and play and swing, to dig and plant and weed and water.

I'm grateful I have the promise of spring to look forward to.  No matter how tired or discouraged I get, the spring inevitably comes - each year and after each of life's winter seasons of hardship.  It's a beautiful promise.

So I look forward.  Not with a perfect brightness of hope, but hope.