It’s February and like many Minnesotans I breathed a sigh of relief when January ended. It’s been a relatively mild winter for us with less snow than usual and several winter thaws that gave welcome relief from the cold weather.
Still, winter is not over yet and white snow blankets the ground. This morning when I woke I decided it was time for a spring break.
I didn’t have to travel far.
A Breath of Spring
I just drove across town to the Como Park Conservatory for my taste of spring. The warm humid air, green plants everywhere, and profusion of flowers in the sunken garden made my soul say “Ahhhhh…”
“Instructions for living a life.
Pay attention.
Be astonished.
Tell about it.”
― Mary Oliver
Bundled in layers, winter coat tied around my waist, winter boots on my feet, I wandered through the conservatory with my camera. The lens of my camera steamed up when I first entered because of the warm moist air on the cold lens.
Oh joy—playing with my camera amongst all this green. What can be better!
Since this month’s camera club topic is abstracts, I looked for abstract compositions as I wandered as well as making photos of the beauty that surrounded me.
Then, I came home and worked on editing the flowers while I listened to Krista Tippet’s recent On Being interview of Mary Oliver. Mary Oliver is my favorite living poet and also one of my all-time favorite poets.
“When it’s over, I want to say: all my life
I was a bride married to amazement.
I was the bridegroom, taking the world into my arms.
When it is over, I don’t want to wonder
if I have made of my life something particular, and real.
I don’t want to find myself sighing and frightened,
or full of argument.
I don’t want to end up simply having visited this world.”
― Mary Oliver
What a lovely way to spend a day. Green things growing, flowers and poetry.
When was the last time you took time out to do something that is pure joy? Isn’t time for a breath of spring?
“Ten times a day something happens to me like this – some strengthening throb of amazement – some good sweet empathic ping and swell. This is the first, the wildest and the wisest thing I know: that the soul exists and is built entirely out of attentiveness.”
― Mary Oliver
May you walk in beauty.
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