Watching Winter

 

My post this week is going to be short and sweet because I am currently caught up in one of my favorite pastimes at this time of year ... I'm watching winter. Yes, it's snowing here, finally, after weeks of only a light dusting, brutal cold, and winds that would knock you over. There's about 5 or 6 inches out there so far and the forecast is for snow showers on and off for the rest of the day. My friends and neighbors might not be as excited as I am to see the snow since I'm not the one out there doing the shoveling or trying to clean off the car .... much as I'd like to (I'm funny that way but I can't help myself).

Just to clarify what I'm doing, I'm not just watching it snow. I'm watching winter. I'm watching how the light is so different at this time of year. I'm watching the crows flying up high, calling to each other and racing across the sky (do crows catch snowflakes on their tongues, I wonder?). I'm watching the small pine trees looking like they were dipped in sugar, and the tiny paw prints of my squirrel neighbors who obviously went out before it got so deep to find breakfast and hurry back home. I'm watching how different the snowflakes are, the really big, fat ones mixed in with the smaller, cotton-like ones, no two alike ... kind of like people, right? I'm watching the faces of the people shoveling and plowing outside, the ones who look mad, and the ones who are smiling ... my fellow winter-watch people!

So, here's the thing: snow, and cold, and winter in general, can either be a good thing or a bad thing, depending on how you look at it. My old mentor, Dr. Wayne Dyer, was fond of reminding us:

"When you change the way you look at things, the things you look at change."

I sure do miss old Dr. Wayne, but his words still guide me, through thick and thin, and through all the winters of my life. So, today, I'm watching winter out of my window, hot chocolate in hand, and feeling nothing but gratitude that I get a window seat on all this beauty.

And so it is.