Posted tagged ‘morning sun’

“…I don’t just wish you rain, Beloved – I wish you the beauty of storms…”

March 23, 2014

More croci and snowdrops have bloomed in the front garden which gets the first sun in the morning. The purple crocus is the newest one. It sits among the many yellow croci. More snowdrops have bloomed beside the steps. Their white flowers are brilliant against the dark of last year’s mulch. Every morning the garden seems to have a new flower, a surprise for me.

A light grey cloudy sky hides the sun. When I look out the den window, the bare branches look stark. The sun usually softens the look of them. No buds have appeared yet, not even on my forsythia always the first to bloom.

When I was a really little kid, I didn’t notice the subtleties of the world around me. I noticed the changing leaves in fall, the trees full of green shading the sidewalk on my way to school and the snow and the rain. I didn’t notice the smell of summer rain or the strange color of the sky before a snow storm until I was a little older. I always wondered how I could have missed them, the wonderful pieces of the changing weather.

I remember how the sky would start to darken and the darkness would deepen and spread. I knew a storm was coming, a huge storm, and I got to watch it from the very beginning. My heart would beat a little faster as the clouds, dark, threatening and scary, moved above me. Sometimes I could even see the rain coming at me, and I’d run into the house. I’d sit by the window and watch it all unfold in front of me. The drops were heavy and there were so many the rain ran like a river in the gutters along the street. The houses near mine became indistinct, hidden by the rain.

I stayed and watched. Sometimes the rain stopped slowly small drop by small drop. Other times it just stopped, finished in its fury.

“There ought to be gardens for all months in the year, in which, severally, things of beauty may be then in season.”

September 26, 2013

My official acknowledgement of autumn was yesterday. The back screen door is now in the cellar and the storm door is in its place. The nights had been too cold to leave the backdoor open so Gracie didn’t have access to her dog door. She would ring the bells to go out, and I’d have to go running to open the door then wait for her. Now Gracie can come and go as she pleases.

The days seem darker to me, the sun less bright. I figure it’s mostly my imaginings at the transition in seasons. The cat still sleeps in the morning sun streaming through the front door so she is content. I am not. Every day seems to bring a change as we rush toward winter. The fall flowers are at their peak. The mums in my garden have all bloomed. The new flowers are planted in the front garden. The deck looks desolate and has pine needles, small twigs and branches and the hulls of sunflower seeds strewn about. Some days I sit in the sun in the afternoon, but I wear a sweatshirt against the chill. The days of short-sleeves have ended. We do have plenty of autumn left so my lament may be early, but the nights are cold. They feel like the first touch of winter.

I’m wearing my slippers and a sweatshirt. The house was cold this morning, colder than when I have the heat going, but I can’t bring myself to start the furnace: it’s the final surrender.

When I go to my old town, I always follow the route I used to walk to school. I notice the changes and remember what used to be there. The house where my friends grew up is gone. It was a pretty white house with red shutters and a trellis by the back door. A house near it was always a favorite of mine. It was an old house, one of the first on the street. It too is gone. In their place is a small brick apartment building, an ugly building with no character, with no homeyness. I am glad I don’t walk that route any more.