Searching for Snowdrops…
the little flower that
heralds the beginning of the end
of winter.
Every year I wait anxiously for my first glimpse of the first perennials that remind me that the days are getting longer now.
After two years of living in Bristol, I know where to look for them to start blooming.
Hello snowdrops.
I’m so delighted that you’ve arrived.
They bloom just outside the library and on the way to the park where I walk Poppy.
There are a few favorite walks in the Cotswolds where I’ve seen them blooming before, and now that I’ve spotted them in town, I want to head to the woods to find the patches that I know are there.
The boys walk right by them, sometimes not even noticing.
Snowdrops start out looking like tiny little upside down tulip blooms.
When they open their petals like wings ready to fly, they are telling me I’ve made it through the deepest part of winter.
Soon all sorts of flowers will be in bloom and I will walk in the light again.
Nothing keeps me as close to the rhythm of the seasons quite like walking.
Throughout the year, my steps on the ground are my fingers on the changing pulse of the days.
I never stop wondering at the way I can know the next day will come.
A new day.
A season ending and another one beginning.
A fresh bloom.
And even though I catch glimpses of snowdrops pushing up from the cold, hard ground in exactly the places I expect them to be,
somehow they still manage to surprise me.
What a wonder.
