Howdy, Spring. You’ve been a long time a-comin’

“But you live in Florida,” you say.

“Why are you complaining?”

I’m not, but I wish for more flowers, more blooming trees, more singing birds ~ strawberries even, which won’t appear until April.

I can never get enough of this gorgeous glory!

 

Azaleas by the lake, 2018

 

 

All in Good Time . . .

If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant.   ~ Anne Bradstreet

He hath made everything beautiful in his time.   ~ Ecclesiastes 4:11

 

 

Paying Attention

I am going to try to pay attention to the spring. I am going to look around at all the flowers, and look up at the hectic tree. I am going to close my eyes and listen.    ~ Anne Lamott

Detail: Bottlebrush tree, Timberlin Parc

 

 

Birds!

Make Friends with the birds, for when you do they will gladly awaken you with sparkling conversations, and lull you to rest with a sweet composition that sums up their day.

~ Anonymous

 

Be like the bird who, pausing in her flight awhile on boughs too slight, feels them give way beneath her, and yet sings, knowing she hath wings.   ~ Victor Hugo

 

 

Egrets in flight, courtesy Cliff Beaman

 

 

Gardening with Mother

Mother Ruth Longenecker from Pennsylvania sowing bean seeds in her daughter Jan’s sandy Florida garden, 1985.  “The soil is so poor,” my dad said, “we need a load of chicken manure.”

 

I love my garden, and I love working in it. To potter with green growing things, watching each day to see the dear, new sprouts come up, is like taking a hand in creation, I think. Just now my garden is like faith – the substance of things hoped for.

~ Lucy Maud Motgomery, Anne’s House of Dreams

 

 

God Sings

From All In, Mark Batterson  excerpts from pages 118 – 119

According to composer Leonard Bernstein, the best translation of Genesis 1:3 . . . is not “and God said.” He believes a better translation is “and God sang.” The Almighty sang every atom into existence, and every atom echoes that original melody sung in three-part harmony by the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

 

Did you know that the electron shell of the carbon atom produces the same harmonic scale as the Gregorian chant? Or that whale songs can travel thousands of miles underwater? Or that meadowlarks have a range of three-hundred notes” But the songs we can hear audibly are only one instrument in the symphony orchestra called creation.

 

Research in the field of bioacoustics has revealed that we are surrounded by millions of ultrasonic songs. Supersensitive sound instruments have discovered that even earthworms make faint staccato sounds! Lewis Thomas put it this way: “If we had better hearing, and could discern the descants of sea birds, the rhythmic tympani of schools of mollusks, or even the distant harmonies of [flies] handing over meadows in the sun, the combined sound might lift us off our feet.”  

 

from Bach’s cantata

* * * 

 

What signals of spring do you most enjoy?

If you tend a garden, what are you planting this spring?

Any garden memories from your childhood? Share these here too.

 

Inspiration for some of the quotes from these websites. Thank you, Linda & Jenn!

Linda Hoye

Jenn Simpson