No winter lasts forever; no spring skips its turn.       – Hal Borland

This time of year, we start to wonder if the winter will ever end. The mornings are cold and grey, the sunset still arrives before supper, and the snow just keeps coming.

After receiving some tragic news this past week, I stomped through the Common with nothing but snow-sleet and sorrow as far as the eye could see. But then, right on the edge of the park near my favorite bench, a tiny spark of yellow glinted through the grey.

Though it’s still deep winter, underneath the cold and the dark and the exhaustion and the grief, the light is already growing.

Dawn is creeping in earlier each morning, the witch hazels are starting to bud, and every so often we wake to a bluebird morning, blinding bright light glinting off the snow.

Dear ones, there are days when the grey sorrows seem endless.

Let’s seek out the sunbeams, whether humans or plants or songs or ideas,

knowing that they are always shining beyond the clouds.

This week’s post is dedicated to Monica and to Queenie,

whose lights will never dim.