On the road home stands this solitary pine...

"Christmas is not a time nor a season, but a state of mind.

To cherish peace and goodwill, to be plenteous in mercy, 

is to have the real spirit of Christmas.

-Calvin Coolidge

Enjoying what is... that has been a difficult thing to do this past year.  The year has been full of unexpected setbacks and disappointments.  I thought I was making great progress in my life only to be derailed.  I'm eager for life to be full and rich again but in that eagerness I do think it's essential to embrace what is.  To even try to enjoy it.  This morning I woke up to a wintry scene out my window.  With such beauty to behold it wasn't hard to embrace what is.  My prayer is that with time I would learn more and more how to embrace and enjoy the bitter along with the sweet.  

Pain

"I have also learned that because of pain, I can feel the beauty, tenderness and freedom of healing."
-C. Joy Bell C.

I forget in the midst of the pain that there is more.  Pain has a way of shouting above everything else.  It is the darkness and it is all consuming.  But the moment a beam of light touches the darkness, the pain, everything begins to change.  One begins to see.... and feel.  See the beauty and feel the tenderness and freedom.  I find it particularly hopeful that every dark experience has a light complement.

This post is for my Aunt Rosemary.

Today my Aunt Shirley and I took a walk in the woods. In the heart of the woods you will find a bowl that is home to these lovely little Trillium.  They are dainty and fragile, wild and free.  As spring embraces the land it isn't hard to find beauty.  I love the beauty of spring and how it slowly emerges from every corner of the woods and fields.