Springtime!

With the time change this past weekend, it's like a dark cloud has been lifted. We had two gorgeous early spring days, the kind where, even though it's still cool, you know winter is on its way out. The grass is still sparse and we have only one lonely crocus up, but that one crocus is the sign that we made it through the winter.

Meditating on spring brought me two realizations:

- This is the our first spring in Maryland in five years, since we moved to Belgium in February 2007. It's been so long, we've forgotten what's planted in our yard. We're waiting - somewhat impatiently - to see which bulb flowers will come up and where.

- As cold as this winter was, I have the impression it wasn't all that bad. We didn't get a lot of snow, especially compared to what this area got in the winter of 2009-2010. But I think it's more than that: it occurs to me that I've been comparing this past season with the three long, dark winters we spent in Belgium, where the only daylight we saw during the week was when we emerged from our cave to go up to the main building for coffee each morning. And more often than not, it was a gray daylight. Gray is the default setting for sky in Belgium. Here, we wake expecting a sunny day, and it's the exception when it's not.

I don't miss gray, but I sure as heck will miss those long summer days!