Ramblings On A Beautiful Morning

I am sitting on my deck typing this on my lap top. The sun is shining warm, and the temperature reads 60 degrees! I have on just a light jacket. There is a light breeze causing the wind chimes to tinkle, and the birds are twittering. It is quite a contrast to the recent snow and ice we just experienced here.

So I am enjoying this little interlude.

I have before me some flowers that my sweet daughters gave me. My family took me out to dinner (Chinese, of course - my favorite) the other night to celebrate my debut as a newspaper columnist. They are so sweet. My son gave me a Starbuck's card that I can register on-line so I can get coffee and free wi-fi at our local coffee shop, while I write. I love that idea.

One of my daughters also gave me chocolate bon-bons she said I would need. So thoughtful, because that is surely the most important thing to fuel my creativity.

So while I am hyped up on chocolate and caffeine, I can whip out my columns in no time!

But seriously, it is so endearing to have such support! I am not used to getting all of this attention and it is somewhat embarrassing. I am the one that is supposed to be cheering them on. That has been my number one priority my entire married life.

It feels kinda good, though.

But tinged with guilt. I grew up in a time when you were warned that the worst thing you could do was to be a 'show-off'. We were raised to be modest and keep our accomplishments to ourselves. Being humble was a virtue.

And I believe that is the truth.

And so, it is very hard for me to accept attention on my behalf. I squirm. I feel uncomfortable. And I like it that way. It keeps me grounded. It keeps me humble. There are so many, much more important issues going on. It keeps things in perspective.

Can you believe that this little pansy is blooming right now? In fact, I have pots and pots of these little charmers blooming all over my deck. They have survived and continued to bloom even after being buried in snow and ice for weeks at a time.

A perfect example of how resilient nature can be.

And remember the humming bird that I was surprised to see in the middle of the snow? I thought she had somehow flown off course and mistakenly ended up here. But I have since done some research and discovered that she is an Anna's Hummingbird, and that yes, they do winter over! She has been coming to my feeder every day. She snacks on my pansies. I keep trying to get a picture, but she is so fast, by the time I get my camera turned on, she has flitted away.

I can't even imagine how such a tiny and delicate creature has survived this terrible winter.

But if you think about it, aren't we all tiny and delicate? As tough as we sometimes think we are, we are really very fragile, surviving on a sometimes inhospitable planet. It is amazing to think of what the human race has been through.

I love to see pictures of our beautiful blue and white swirled planet from space. So tiny and fragile in this immense Universe. I wish everyone could look at life from that perspective every day. Maybe they would understand how precious each day is.

It is not because we have fought each other and killed each other that we have survived. It is because we have joined together to build lives and cooperated with each other, that we have come this far.

We are all the same.

We all came from the same place and will be leaving the same way.

We are in this together.

Fragile, yet resilient. Like the pansies and the hummingbird. Who need each other to survive.