February is the wink of a many-seasoned grandmother. Winter can feel, weaving darkness into most of our waking hours, day after cold dark day, as if it will not end. We are left to journey on the vitality of the thinnest thread of light. It is not easy holding the vision of seeing beyond the immediacy of our days, to nurturing the wisdom of hope in the quiet despair of Winter’s darkness.
It is in the days of February when our ancient grandmother, coming from the northern place of ancient ones, pulls aside the curtain that separates one season from the next to reveal the returning longer days of light.
There is still a winter chill in the early morning air, a frozen dew touching the earth, a gray cast to many of these days — but the dawn is coming earlier and the sun setting later each day. The geese fly overhead honking the announcement of their return; the frog leaps across the new green beginning to emerge from the earth; the salmon position for their Spring run.
The long days of light are indeed returning to us now. We can feel it, we can sense the Spring ahead. Our spirit brightens, our planning begins, our level of activity rises. The growing season is before us and there is a delight to the gathering of seeds, to creating the blueprint of the garden, to the promise of potential and possibility that comes with new growth.
A softening to the nature of Winter’s nature is arriving and gentler days of gladness greet us.