Hope Springs Eternal

February is over. That month when so many people are filled with the doldrums has passed, and now it is March. It’s not yet spring here, but it’s becoming very nearly spring-like. You can smell it in the air, the hints of green. There are a few brave blooms poking up here and there. And the days are getting longer.

It amazes me, sometimes, how tenacious life is. How it can overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles and flourish. Like the dandelion in the crack of the sidewalk, or the wee babe who simply refuses to give up, life is a force to be reckoned with. No other season reminds me of that more surely than spring, when life springs up everywhere after the long winter.

And in our house, I recently rediscovered life’s tenacity for myself. I have a few houseplants that have somehow managed to survive my children. I don’t know how, it’s a miracle really, but they’ve made it. I had one that had two lovely stalks covered in leaves, and one day Hannah walked into the living room holding one of them. She’d taken her scissors and cut it off as a ‘gift’ for me. I was so very sad, but I did manage not to totally lose it. She really was trying to be nice, so I explained as calmly as I could why we don’t cut the tops off of Mama’s plants.

And then a few days back I looked more closely at the ’stump’ that Hannah had left behind. Once again, new life is victorious. Can you feel it? Better days just may be ahead.