I tried. You know I tried. I mean, look at the archive! I’ve got a whole bunch of seasonally-inspired normal blogs going all the way back to…
Ok, just five posts only going back to Lammas. I couldn’t even keep up the normal blog thing for a year. Normal, like, “Hello, folks! Here’s what I’m doing/thinking/feeling. Here’s a poem! Wishing you well, toodle-oo till next time!”
In my little world of joy and happiness (I’m not being facetious), the Festival of Ostara — spring equinox, celebration of earth’s renewal and fertility — is green and golden, lush and lovely. The nights are clear and star-filled. The days are bright, sweet-scented, and filled with birdsong. A few hours ago we hit equilibrium. Dark and light were in perfect balance. The scales have tipped; from here to Mabon, the light holds sway.
Pileated Woodpecker pics courtesy of Roy Jimenez, whose close encounter inspired a morning’s worth of the Woody Woodpecker theme song. Check out — and listen to — the woodpecker HERE and for the theme song, HERE ya go.
Also in my own universe, Ostara is delightfully romantic. It’s our 44th anniversary and the 8th for our daughter and yerno (son-in-law) — double happiness!
Love abounds. Mother Nature is being nothing but kind. So what’s the hitch?
Right, well, season of renewal and all that … here’s where I renew my habit of bemoaning the follies of the human race.
The profusion of plum trees in full bloom and thigh-high grasses are about a month premature. Thanks, anthropogenic global warming.
The nation I call home is teetering on the precipice of authoritarianism. Best case scenario, imho, Biden wins the next presidential election and the losers attempt a violent overthrow of the government.
Viktor Orbán didn’t just visit Dickwad Drumpf at Mar-a-Lago. He visited the Heritage Foundation (extremist far-Right think tank) in Washington, D.C. Basically did a Teach-In on how to overthrow democracy and establish an enduring fascist oligarchy in America — same as he did in Hungary.
The MAGA morons in Congress are gleefully undermining the stability of the entire Free World by preventing the US from sending aid to Ukraine.
Upwards of 65,000,000 women and girls of childbearing age are caught in the crossfire of the Dobbs decision and subsequent state-instigated anti-abortion laws.
America’s wanna-be dictator and presumptive Republican presidential nominee means to strip all non-MAGA Americans of virtually all their rights when he returns to the White House — which he thinks he’ll do regardless of how the vote turns out. He’s already promised us a “bloodbath” if he’s not elected.
I could go on (and on, and on …), but the clincher, the horror that weighs on my heart every waking moment and troubles my dreams is that more than 12,300 children have died in Gaza in the last four months, more than died in four years of world conflicts.
What kind of monsters are we, what political insanity have we normalized to make this atrocity a regrettable but acceptable reality? What kind of social fabric have we woven that holds barely a thread of true compassion or empathy? What amoral abyss lies in the hearts of those in power?
Ostara 2024 has me on a teeter-totter. Sometimes I’m up, delighting in the pleasures of spring (ooh! there’s the woodpecker again, right outside my window!) and in the love of friends and family. Sometimes I’m down, weeping at the enormity of the hate and cruelty in the world, and the suffering of innocents.
My daughter recently sent me a poem that speaks to my current angst. (As it’s a public post, I assume I’m not infringing on any copyrights here?)
May this post within a post inspire you to bug your representatives one more time.
And may Ostara’s beauty bring you joy.
Risa, what a beautiful post on a beautiful spring day/evening. I especially enjoyed the woodpeckers, the songs & most of all……Woody.
Pics are wonderful, just like the real thing, up & down the Valley.
Abrazos for you & Roy…..tu amigo, echándote de menos……Adrian
Thanks, my friend. As for that last, y nosotros también – but we can fix that. Looks like more rain this week, but next is clear. Te llamaré o te enviaré un correo electrónico :)
I feel very much on the same teeter totter. Just so excited to have some sunshine and warmth here in Colorado and to be able to be out and about in it it’s early spring here still with the likelihood of snow coming. But definitely the tide is turning towards warmer sunnier days which is great and I also share your own related to the people in Gaza is so frustrating and so just kind of unthinkable in a modern world.
Oh, yes, my gosh, I remember early Spring in the mountains! Spring snows aren’t bad at all (unless they’ve changed?). The world goes white for a bit, soft ice-cold powder drops weightless over everything, piling up to unbelievable heights. Then the white moves on, the sun comes out, the snow melts away, and everyone’s back to enjoying the gorgeous outdoors in their shirt-sleeves. Blessed BE!
As for the modern world (sigh). It’s just the world, isn’t it? As it’s always been, sometimes less hell-in-a-handbasket, sometimes more? When I learned about the children’s death-toll in Gaza, my mind went to Euripides’ The Trojan Women and the death of Astyanax. Helen hooking up with Paris was not justification for smashing a baby’s brains out against a wall. Hamas’ attack on October 7th isn’t justification for genocide. And yet …
Thanks for the photo credit
And thanks for being my love and companion for the last 44+ years
For the rest, well, maybe we (humanity) have a chance to muddle through
[insert sad but trying to be hopeful emoji here]
Smartest thing this eternal pessimist ever did was marry a handsome cockeyed optimist.
Oh, and see my reply to the comment below … but who’s counting?
Oh, and Happy 44th Anniversary!
Thanks! :) Not to brag, but it’s 44 years married / 49 years together. (!)
Silly me, of course! The 49 is the number that really matters!
;)
I feel you. You and the poem say it all. I pass each day with attempts to see the beautiful, punctuated by an ongoing and underlying sense of dread. But we cannot deny the Spring. It will carry on, whether we embrace it or not. The next generation of house wrens have returned to build their own nests. The bean seedlings are bursting forth. The soil has been turned and amended. So I will plant yet again, with hope.
Ah, lovely! Kind of underlines how fortunate we are, though, that we live in a place where the beauty of Spring is all about us, a balm to our sore hearts and frayed nerves, food for our souls. The root of the sadness that sometimes overwhelms me lies in knowing that far too many are living in Hell, where there is no Spring to embrace.
Yes, I don’t recall Dante writing spring into one of his levels of hell . . .
You are not alone, living somewhere on the event horizon of existence. We seem to stumble from the banal to the horrific. And back again. No answers here. I’m currently going with the flow, though it feels more like a tide. At least, for now, there are dogs. And woodpeckers. X
Feels more like a tsunami to me, probably because those few issues I mention in the post are but the tip of the tip of the ‘Murican iceberg. But you’ve got the right of it. There are dogs and woodpeckers, after all. And good friends halfway ’round the world who find the time to commiserate and offer a bit of cheer.