I haven't worn a coat in almost 2 weeks, I can go for a walk outside without survival instincts dictating my pace ("run faster or you will freeze and die," they say), and everywhere I look: flowers, green.
Lucky for me I live in Atlanta where greenery knows no bounds (though unfortunately, nor does pollen), and I can combine running, botanizing, aaaand listening to NPR podcasts into one, invigoratingly nerdy experience.
The act of running past pristinely landscaped West Atlanta homes, flanked by Boxwoods and brimming with Flowering Quince, Hellebores, and Dogwood, breathes life into my bored and tired eyes. It reminds me that the strange and beautiful things I try to put on paper and canvas are hardly original at all, and do not hold a flame to the arrestingly graceful perfection of something so delightful as Wisteria. They also remind me that "earth tones" include magenta and chartreuse (see: Azalea, Forsythia).
These magnificent things grow naturally out of the dirt - wild, intricate, audacious, weird, fantastic.
Springtime is here. Take it in, folks.
For thoughts on the significance of seeds being buried, staying there for a while, then shooting out of the ground into something unimaginably beautiful (in relation to Easter), listen here.
