Beyond My Window
In our bedroom there is a large window. It overlooks the vegetable garden in the front yard.
Beyond the garden is a large enclosure where four “special needs” geese spend their nights. On the other side of the driveway is a tool shed and beyond that, up the driveway a little further, I can just make out the roof line of our little chicken coop. I can’t see much else as my view is obstructed by a dense growth of trees.
Our home is in the woods. My view of the world from this vantage point may seem limited.
Still, this time of year offers a little more distance, as all but the pine trees stand naked, shivering against a low angled sun. The window faces towards the east. The rising sun and the rising moon both greet us through this window and are the reason for the thick shade that is pulled down every night.
Even with the window closed and the shade drawn there is still life that comes calling. Some nights we lay awake listening to the sounds of the others we share the forest with. Screech owls and Barred owls call out their territories, yipping coyotes, fighting raccoons, and the occasional hound dog on the hunt. In the spring and summer months, whip-poor-wills and a multitude of insects add their voices to the night-time aria.
In a couple of weeks, the songs of anxious birds will begin before first light. They arrive back from a long and dangerous journey to claim jurisdiction over a temporary domain, by singing loudest and most often in the hopes of gaining the attention of a female with particularly high standards. Winters can seem long when the days are so short. But there is something to be excited about in every season.
In the mornings, when I get out of bed, I want to pull up the shade and greet the day. But I can’t be too hasty. There are four pairs of eyes that have drawn a bead on that window waiting for movement. Even the dogs resting on the front porch are alert to the sound of the blind going up and start their happy dance in anticipation of following me on the morning rounds. The geese erupt all at once like Hell has just broken loose, and know that soon they will be released from the confines of their nightly prison and can resume their bossy patrolling of the grounds. Even so, most mornings I can still spare a moment after the blind is raised to acknowledge the beauty surrounding us and my gratefulness for a place in it.
The next few weeks will be an exciting time as spring unfolds herself and paints brilliant new colors, conjures intoxicating aromas and saturates her time and space with the music of breezes, birds and insects. A soundtrack for the emerging new life of her season. This is the world where I want to live. A place where every rock or rotting log I turn over disturbs a community that will never be the same. Where pulling on one thing, you find it connected to another, and ultimately, to yourself.
There is a special time every year, Usually sometime around the end of May or the beginning of June. It’s different from year to year and region. But I can feel it’s beginning even before I awake. In fact, it is what wakes me up. Somethings happening. The birds’ songs seem more intense, the grass and leaves are the greenest green, pollen is thick in the air, everything is peaking, spring and summer are merging. Spring is not ready to let go and summer has waited long enough. Both giving everything at once. It makes me want to run, to love, to celebrate, create . . . feel. Ten days, two weeks, I’ll awake and I know it’s finished. Summer has won the battle.
The days are long now but time is short. Fall will begin her campaign for dominance in due course. But nature in all her acts reflects her faith in the future. For spring, and the new life she brings, is never far and will always come.