One breezy spring day, when I was walking down the sidewalk next to my daughter’s school, I noticed piles of pink cherry blossom petals against the curb. The wind had coaxed them off the trees and collected and deposited them at my feet. They still looked fresh--pink and delicate and perfect.
I stopped to stare. There were so many petals! I had this urge to lean down, gather them up, and stuff them in my pockets for later, for some other season when it felt like spring would never come again.
Maybe for some cold day in January or blistering afternoon in August or blustery dark evening in November.
But of course, wishing for spring would mean I would miss all the treasures of whatever season I’m in.
Like the longer days of summer, with lightning bugs, the tart-sweetness of fresh lemonade on a hot afternoon, the smell of newly-mown grass, the deep blue-purple hydrangeas in our yard.
And wishing for spring would mean overlooking the abundance of fall--the colorful show of the leaves, blessedly cooler temperatures, the crisp fragrance of change, the flavor of cinnamon apples and pumpkin bread.
I’d miss winter, too, with its strange and spare beauty, cold air making freckled noses pink and exhales turn to steam, frost on holly berries, and delicate pink camellia blossoms.
And I would miss winter's promise of spring’s coming, of new life inside the cold earth. The anticipation of renewal, the Resurrection.
On that spring day years ago, if I hadn’t been such an Adult, I would have picked up a handful of those petals and held them for a moment, noting their ephemeral beauty, until the wind picked them up again and carried them off somewhere else.
I couldn't have held onto them any more than I could hold onto time itself. But I could stop and take a moment to enjoy them, to enjoy whatever was happening that day and that season of my life. And to be thankful. Even if it wasn’t my favorite season, and it didn't seem abundant with beauty and good things.
Now, as I watch the seasons change every year, and note the good things that each one brings, I have gotten better at looking for the beauty in each season of my own life.
And understanding that little moments of beauty make up a life of beauty and good things. And ultimately, that’s what I want to leave behind.