Spring

I love everything about Spring.

New life, new beginnings, color, sunshine, warmth, growth the fact that we, like all of the animals come out of hibernation...all of it.

Our community has struggled, been brought to it's knees this winter.

It's been too much for many of us, for our community as a whole.

I am a pretty optimistic person, yet I found myself oppressed, wanting to cocoon this week.

Needing to feel safe and to be distracted and to retreat to my self made bubble.

Today, the first day of Spring, it's a little cooler than the incredible temperatures we had been experiencing this March Break. It's a little gray as the mixed precipitation forecast for tomorrow gathers and prepares for it's appearance....yet, it is SPRING. As I listen to the birds singing outside my window...I am reminded once again of what Spring really represents to me ...HOPE.

As tough as the circumstances of this winter have been, (the weather was incredibly mild and free from almost any snow), winter is over.

Oh, it might still feel like winter periodically in the weeks to come, but winter is OVER and Spring is here and it is time to live, to love, to grow, to change and to come out of hibernation.

It is time to allow hope to be renewed and to believe for more. To know that the best is yet to come and that those amazing days of summer we love are just around the corner.

Spring can be an interesting time of year...we can go from gorgeous summer weather one day to wet, messy winter like weather the next. Today, I am full of anticipation because I know there are some incredible and beautiful surprises that will come with the Spring even in the midst of the difficulty.

If there is one thing I have learned, it is that difficulty and tragedy are unavoidable and uncontrollable...but what I do with it, what and who I choose to focus on in the middle of it; that is what will make the difference in whether I grow stronger or weaker because of it.

Today, once again, I choose life, I choose to hear the robin sing even as the clouds darken right above my head. I choose to remember that "this too shall pass".

I choose to trust in the knowledge that My God's plans for me are for good:

Jeremiah 29:11

For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

Happy Spring!!