Woke up this morning to 9 degrees. The forecast is for high 50's to maybe even 60 by Wednesday. Welcome to upstate New York's own brand of March Madness. It's that time when Mother Nature's identity crisis is in full bloom. Alas, nothing else is.
This has got to be the hardest month for me to get through as I've said before ... many, many times, which tells you how crazy it makes me. So I try to look for some little thing that will perk up my spirits and remind me that, regardless of how it feels outside. a.k.a 9 degrees, winter really will end and spring really will arrive. Enter one smart and wonderful 6th grade teacher.
Yesterday while having Sunday dinner with my daughter and her family, my 11 year old grandson brought me a package he had received from his English teacher. It was a bag of potting soil and a tiny envelope with some sunflower seeds. His assignment was to plant the seeds and nurture the plant until it could be planted outside. Once upon a time I used to volunteer at his elementary school as part of their garden project and we worked together on the school gardens together. So he asked me to help him give his seeds a good, healthy start. If a heart can smile, mine did yesterday.
What a wonderful thing his teacher did, not just for the gift of the soil and the seeds, but for the sentiments and the lesson that came with it. As tired as we all are of being stuck in the house for a year, and with spring just around the corner, I cannot even imagine what the children are going through. Think of being a kid, away from your friends, your sports, your sense of community, and the feel of real participation in your classroom, some of them for a year, while winter seems to drag on endlessly. Then, one day, the mailman brings you a gift beyond measure: a promise in a bag, a promise that spring will come, and that out of all this something beautiful will grow. That's more than some seeds in an envelope and a bag of dirt; that's a lesson on life to grow with.
So I ask you: what can you plant today to grow into something beautiful tomorrow?
And so it is.
