Seasons

Feature photo by Daiga Ellaby on Unsplash

It’s spring here in the south of France. This weekend the wind turned warm, the garden, after months of hibernation has suddenly started budding and growing at a rate of knots, the sun warms me up and strips off jumpers and scarves as I do my weekly weeding of the gravel.

We haven’t yet had the Saints de Glace, the official end to the cold weather but already the warmer temperatures are fooling us into thinking they are here to stay.

Our yearly outdoor chores have begun and thoughts are starting to turn to filling gas bottles for the bbq and to friends we haven’t seen during the winter months when the freezing Mistral blasted through us.

After five years of living here I can see we are travelling through the year at the pace of the seasons and I like it. These first warm breezes that rustle the huge pine trees in the garden, the unveiling of patches of violets as I mow the overlong grass, the sunshine sparkling boxes of shiny strawberries, these things bring me not just joy in the now but joy in the memories of past years too.

I look at them, feel them, smell them, touch them and this feeling of delight of refinding a good thing wells up in me.

I find I need it too.

My heart dinged with self-identification at the instagram post of a friend who, weary with all the sucky things that are happening in the world at the moment, shut the door, lit a beautiful candle and just enjoyed the peace and beauty of her living room.

I know that feeling.

The relentlessness of having to make an effort in relationships, hearing about war and hardship, constantly being covid-flexible, having plan B, C, D, E and F in place, of parenting, of finances, of sick kids, of emotional outbursts, of problems that need solving, of heart-aching tragedy and long long long journeys with no end in sight.

Sometimes we need to shut the door on these things, to stop our minds going to those places and enjoy the small beauties, the gifts of the now moment that bring us delight. And sometimes we need to create those moments for ourselves just so we can open the door again and face all that’s on the other side.

The other day I thought of part of this quote from CS Lewis in The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe :

“They say Aslan is on the move- perhaps has already landed.”
And now a very curious thing happened. None of the children knew who Aslan was any more than you do; but the moment the Beaver had spoken these words everyone felt quite different. Perhaps it has sometimes happened to you in a dream that someone says something which you don’t understand but in the dream it feels as if it has some enormous meaning- either a terrifying one which turns the whole dream into a nightmare or else a lovely meaning too lovely to put into words, which makes the dream so beautiful that you remember it all your life and are always wishing you could get into that dream again. It was like that now. At the name of Aslan each one of the children felt something jump in its inside. Edmund felt a sensation of mysterious horror. Peter felt suddenly brave and adventurous. Susan felt as if some delicious smell or some delightful strain of music had just floated by her. And Lucy got the feeling you have when you wake up in the morning and realize that it is the beginning of the holidays or the beginning of summer

I find that often the physical reality reflects the spiritual reality of what is going on and for me this season of spring feels significant, it feels like, just as the wind changes direction too, just like Aslan was on the move bringing changes, so too is God on the move. I don’t know what he’s doing yet but this year feels different. It feels to me like it is not just a physical season that is changing but that there is a spiritual season changing too and that is is one that is bringing an expectation of hope and joy with it.

And in general, this is how I have found it to be with the things of God, you sense that a change is in the air even before you see it. You don’t know what is happening until it does and then you say to yourself, aha, so that is what he was up to, I can see how all the dots join now! And everything suddenly makes sense.

I don’t know what is coming but I think it’s going to be good.