.....notice me

Yogis,
This Thursday we celebrate the winter solstice. The shortest day and longest night in the northern hemisphere as the sun drops to her most southern position. To be more precise, the winter solstice occurs on Thursday at 10:27 pm. The moment. A pause. While each day forward will then become an almost imperceptible bit longer, the solstice also ushers in the winter season.

The light and cold arrive hand in hand.

Around here winter has taken her sweet time in approaching, perhaps waiting for the solstice. Yes, we have had an occasional scraping of windshields and even an unexpected wake up to a coating of snow. Dandelions, however, are still surprising me in my gravel driveway with bright cheerful faces and I spent yesterday raking the last falling leaves, wearing only a long sleeve shirt.

The trees know though, even if we question, that winter will indeed set in. They now sit bare.

‘Notice me’, they call as I run to the river. ‘Notice me,’ they whisper as I walk up the driveway. ‘Notice me,’ they say as a posture I take in my practice twists me toward the window. When I do look, it’s almost as if they stand taller, spreading their branches wider to beam. Winter beauty.

Towering over me, my mighty oak reaches toward the blue morning sky. The sycamore spotlighted by the low afternoon sun. A crescent moon peering through the branches of the walnut tree. Sculptures beyond any we may find in our manmade world.

Naked, we can see the intricacy of their branches resembling our own lungs. A crow perched at the top peers down on all of us. A tangled mass of leaves, moss and sticks sits precariously in the crook of the tree. A squirrel’s head emerges just as the sun rises. The cardinal offers an unexpected flash of color in an otherwise brown and gray landscape.

Winter, with its simplicity, asks us to notice. Without the trappings and distractions of summer we can see the trees, our lives and one another more clearly. As we all truly are.

Notice the trees.

Notice me,
SARAH