THE PROMISE OF SPRING

Today was an exceptionally beautiful California day, the kind for which we can feel extra grateful during this pandemic: ideal weather to be outside, allowing us to ease our covid isolation with a socially distanced soaking in of the sun.

I spent the afternoon today catching up with some friends in the beautiful, giant back yard of their new house. Finding themselves in a new working paradigm (from home), they realized a month or two into the pandemic that they needed more space in order to stay sane and married, and so they took the opportunity to accelerate their already in-development plans to buy their first home together, finding a beautiful corner house in the east bay with a large outdoor space.

Touring their home, it was so inspiring to see all of the work they had done on the place since buying it last fall. They had remodeled the kitchen mostly themselves, and they had built a big deck on which we were able to spread out as we ate lunch. The previous owners had apparently been fans of trees, and they had planted a variety of beautiful deciduous trees throughout the yard. Still being winter, the trees were all barren at first glance, but as we toured the yard, upon closer inspection I couldn’t help but notice how many tiny green buds were forming at ends of each branch. Seeing the physical embodiment of this next chapter of my friends’ life in the Bay combined with the signs of spring’s imminent arrival, I felt reminded that the moment of this pandemic will pass eventually, despite how interminable it feels.

My venerated colleague, Stephanie Blythe, tweeted this morning: “I don’t want to return to ‘normal.’ I want better than ‘normal.’” Thinking about her morning twitter musing, looking at the tiny previews of the green that will soon fill the canopy of those trees in my friends’ backyard, I felt a little tinge of hope for the rebirth that the return of spring promises. We will emerge eventually from this long, deadly, viral winter. There is such hope that when we do, we will not only be a world reborn, but hopefully also transformed for the better.