[5]
[6]
by Jen Rouse
The Short Years [7]
At first, I am pleased with the cold weather, happy for my cozy sweaters and hot teas and frozen mornings.
But crisp fall turns to grey and soggy winter, and the refreshment of snow comes far too rarely, and then, just when all the color has been washed out of our days and we’re and waterlogged to the core, it comes. This gift of spring [8].
How do you live in this valley for three decades and still forget? When the seasons turn (and they always do) it’s not just that suddenly the sun is back. It’s that suddenly life is back [9]. We’re all born-again together: the robins, whose song I haven’t heard in months; the little newborn leaves, scarlet, shooting up from the rose bushes; and we the people, coming out of our houses and blinking like babies in the sun.
If I could turn cartwheels, I would.