excerpt for a New Book, Misplaced Spring Day

A Misplaced Spring Day

January, 2011. Finally, warmer, sunny days. On the first of these, everyone was “out,” cordial and loud – even squirrels and bush birds. Finches, Juncos, Nuthatches, Sparrows - though the Raven pair watched me without a sound, still and regal, great thinkers. In the wetlands, I noticed the tentative song of the frogs, the sounds of spring - in winter.

The light is beautiful, reflections silver-bright, even the pine needles hold the light. The scents are beautiful: warm pine and cedar, ethereal flowery scents that are here, and then gone.

I anticipate misplaced spring days in winter – misplaced summer days in spring, although they often make me feel nostalgic, make me feel a longing, an anxiety – because I know that loss is as inevitable as love?

Running, I spread my “wings;” the essence of the day lightens me; I feel brave. (In memory, I hear Stu singing, a phrase here, a phrase there. I hear his voice when I listen to the recording of BeatusVir; hear him among the other baritones; hear a voice that is mellow and true.)

It is on misplaced summer days in spring that I rush into my garden to set my seedlings. It is on misplaced summer days in the fall that I long for the dust of the trail; and in summer, in the high mountains, I feel the winter cold of blowing snow.

I am more inclined to collect things on misplaced days. Today, I pocketed a rock, black and shiny with stripes of quartz; I will carry it for awhile. I pocketed laurel leaves, the scent of California wild.

Beautiful days bow to cold nights - when we ask, “Wasn't it a beautiful day?”

There will be others, though.

In the seasons, we will learn to bless the passing of time and the days that take our hearts – with the splash of ache and the rush of ecstasy.