Waiting For Spring

Winter has been long this year. Really. Really. Long.

Extreme colds and extreme hots are not my favorite weather.

I do not spend time in mid winter wishing it were 90 degrees. I hate 90 degrees as much as I hate 20 degrees.

I am more of a middle ground woman. With most things actually.

Middle temperatures are where I’m most comfortable.

Give me a day in the 70’s any time.

For that reason, I like Spring and Fall the best.

Unfortunately, these seasons are shortest where I live. They are a brief few days or a couple of weeks at best.

The rest of the time is spent freezing and trying to stay warm, or sweating while I simply sit and try to remain cool.

So I wait.

I wait for Spring and Fall.

I hope that they will come on time, and maybe have a chance at lasting a season’s worth of comfortable temperatures.

It rarely happens, but I remain hopeful each season.

So when everyone else is wanting and wishing for 80 or 90 degree days, I am silently awaiting a day in the 50’s, 60’s or 70’s.

Waiting for that day when I don’t feel chilly just getting out of bed in the morning, or I don’t feel like I’m going to start on fire after my shower before I get dressed.

Not too hot.

Not too cold.

Just. Right.

The Moon

Ever since I was a very young child, I was entranced by the moon. I watched it follow us in the car at night. I wondered how it did that? How did it know how to go everywhere we went?

Its light is such lovely glow. It teases in the sky and gets you to look at it. It’s like a giant nightlight globe for all of us.

Looking at the moon doesn’t hurt like looking at the sun. The moon has taken just enough light from our sun so that we may share in its beauty without getting hurt. I wonder if the sun is jealous?

I remember from my childhood people talking about, “the man in the moon.” I didn’t understand what they meant. I expected to see a tiny man walking around up there, perhaps waving down at us from time to time. I never saw him.

I love when the moon is full, and it casts its silver light down on everything below. Silver light. How does it do that?

It’s no wonder there are songs, poems and legends based around the moon. It is very alluring. Simple, yet amazing at the same time. It phases in and out, and gets us to follow its schedule.

It’s a quiet temptress.

Sunsets

I have a thing for sunsets. I mean, I really dig them. I love them. They are a magical feast for my eyes.

I grew up spending summers on a lake. We were on the east side, which meant we got to see sunsets every time there was one. Now, perhaps it’s because of this exposure to them that I love them so much. But you would think that seeing them nearly every day, I would take them for granted.

No.

Not even close.

I adore them.

When I was a teenager, I went out to the end of the dock and watched them. I was so enthralled, they took me away to their magical, fiery world. The clouds welcomed me into their realm, always happy, always smiling. I traveled there, among the clouds, and watched the brilliant, ever changing color show in awe.

Now that I am older, with a family of my own, I sometimes miss the opportunity to enjoy a sunset like that. I try to make time for it. It never disappoints.

The moment between dusk and dark is an amazing thing to see.

It is an event.

To see darkness creeping slowly, steadily up onto the blue sky is like nothing else I have ever watched. Yet it happens every day. It happens whether we watch it or not.

But I highly recommend watching it.

Get outside and trip out on a sunset. You won’t regret it.

Nature

The smell of the first snow fall.

Looking at individual snowflakes.

The magical wonder of a snowy landscape.

Sparkling snow.

Lying down in the moist, green grass of spring.

Wiggling your toes in perfectly sun-warmed sand.

Walking outside and smelling spring in the air after a long, cold winter.

Luscious shades of green taking over the woods.

Dew.

Seeing the fawns play in the yard.

The sight of colorful blooms breaking forth out of the ground.

Sitting on a dock bathing in the hot sun with the cool lake beneath you.

Lying in a boat in the middle of the beautiful, blue lake and looking up at the sky.

Sunsets.

The sound of the brook gently trickling through the yard while I swing on the hammock.

Brilliant color displays on the trees every fall, like nature’s fireworks.

The smell and feel of dirt on my hands.

Frost.

Seeing birds soar.

Just a few of my loves in nature that make me feel one with the Earth.

What are yours?

Dream Visits

Have you ever had dreams with people who have passed away in them? Whenever I have these dreams, the person is so clear, even if the rest of the dream is not. I believe these are visits from these people. They come to us in our dreams, because that is neither our reality or their realm (whatever that realm may be). It is a place in the middle, where anything can happen (and usually does).

Have you ever had dreams where you meet or hang out with a celebrity? I have had many of these through the years, and they always seem to come out of nowhere. The celebrity just appears, and of course there are some weird, dreamlike sequences that take place. They amuse me.

Have you ever had dreams with people you don’t know in them? I have had these as well, and always wonder if they are real people out in the world that maybe I have seen for just a second out and about and my mind simply places them in my dream? Or if there is some connection with this person out there that I don’t even know? Like somehow there is something that binds us, even though we don’t know it. We can experience the dream realm together. Somehow our minds know, even though we don’t.

Having all types of dreams makes me wonder; do the other parties in the dream have the same dream? Are we in the dream realm together? Have you ever had a dream with a friend in it, and you asked them if they had the dream too?

Even if they say no, perhaps it’s because they just don’t remember it. Perhaps because it was your dream, not theirs, that they were not meant to remember it, it was too cloudy for them. Perhaps when we don’t remember dreaming, it’s because we were pulled into someone else’s, and it was too cloudy for us.

No matter the night, everyone dreams. It’s the mind doing whatever it needs to do, without us interfering, so it can get us through the next day. So sleep on good people, sleep and dream on…