The pink and white peach blossoms popped first. They came before any green buds that resulted in finger like leaves. I had never noticed the order of this unfolding of Nature before and found it another curious aspect after a dream of an apple tree with fully ripe fruit hanging at the center of still perfectly formed and intact blossoms.
Last summer our family was so excited to have peaches. It was a novelty following a big move to a new home with this beautiful little tree in the yard. We missed out, however, on the bounty of the harvest due to poor planning, inexperience, and misplaced fruit. A lesson learned that won’t be repeated this year.
Nature unfolds through the seasons and while we are just coming out of winter with trees bare and a wet bone cold that comes with our climate we are in the midst of a global situation that is taking our own human natures down a deep path with no clear ending in sight. In fact, the fear is that the dark times of the wet bone cold are just beginning even as Nature draws spring near.
And, I consider that spring will happen without us in some ways this year. We still have unraveling and purging and surrendering to the depths of dark and cold to do. Oh, it would be easy to say, “Spring has sprung and Nature calls us to celebrate the expanding light and new growth.” But remember what happens in Nature….when we uncover the plants too soon, or set our pretty pots of spring flowers out and another hard, hard frost comes.
We lay good to waste when we act in haste. And this is not a time to be wasteful.
No, this spring is not calling us all to rise and let go of cares to play. And yet, She does not fail to provide us absolute Beauty and splendor and bounty for our journey down if we tend her well. She does not call us away from the work to be done, She offers nourishment and reveals the prize to be warmly held through and at the end of the deep work. We learn from Her that there is always Beauty somewhere in the midst of our wet bone cold journey….not to distract us….but to give us strength to keep on course even in the darkest times.
And so, I keep the lights low a bit longer. I stay close and make sure the pantry is stocked for what is ahead as if we were just beginning to face the winter time. And I touch in with my Sisters in the far south where autumn is on their horizon as spring is on ours and I see a glimpse of the greater turning as Nature offers Her Beauty there as well.
I am fed and inspired by the Beauty of the greening peach tree as I remember a dream of an apple tree with fully ripe fruit hanging at the center of still perfectly formed and intact blossoms. And I'm digging deep, still searching for the clues and the seeds to plant when our inner spring returns.