Spring? I Hope Eternally.

You guys. It was 47 degrees Fahrenheit outside today (I specify so that all my international readers will understand. ha.).

This happened:

Almost two years old. I kid you not.

Just look at that face. Joy, my friends, sheer happy-sunshine-outdoor-playtime-muddied-jacket-joy. The air is damp, the ground is soggy, and one of the ducks has started laying again. I'm going to go right out and say it: Spring is on the way. 

I know that you know this. Spring has a way of arriving pretty much every year, but somewhere along the dark-and-dreary-frozen-bleak of February, we forget. We become a winter people, slogging along with the determined steps of folk who are just trying to get through one more day. 

And then we enter into March. Oh, March, you sly vixen, you. The snow will yet fly on us, the ice will yet cause our spring-longing hearts to fear, but March brings us the promise of gleeful days, unbound by hats-and-gloves-and-boots for every trek. 

I think it is no coincidence that Lent often falls in this in-between time of the seasons. Though we are led out into the desert liturgically, we have the promise of the Resurrection to sustain us.  Though we join ourselves to Christ's sufferings, we know what joy awaits us. Our winter shall not last forever; we are a Spring  people, a Resurrection people, and we shall yet sing again!

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"I believe that I shall see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living! Wait for the Lord; be strong, and let your heart take courage; yea, wait for the Lord." Psalm 27:13-14