Beautiful, unexpected

Standing on the deck with my morning coffee, I look out through the woods and down the path that runs toward the compost pile. Yesterday a hungry, 400-pound black bear emerged from hibernation and tore it apart. Now, half-decomposed frozen garbage, black soil and wet leaves are strewn in a 20-foot radius around what used to be a tidy pile.

This is the Vermont tourists never see. Inns are closed, their owners either on vacation in the Bahamas or fixing roofs and painting rooms for the coming season. There are no hikers, since walking on sodden trails destroys fragile forest flora, no skiers since the ice turns the runs that are left into granular slush, and no cyclists since the winter’s frost heaves have left the roads with asphalt moguls, unexpected sink holes, and crumbled edges.

Then in a heartbeat everything changes. A spring snow blankets the mountain, the sun spins high above the trees, and, by mid-morning, the snow melts and the air turns soft.

Stepping off the deck, I can see and feel the change. Here and there, the hardy northern mosses that carpet our forest paths have begun to shimmer with an almost ethereal green. The mists that surround the pines lift far enough to reveal a bear—smaller than my midnight marauder—leaving her den with the season’s new cubs. Peepers begin to move out of the wetlands and slowly migrate into streams that travel the hills. The buds on mountain magnolias swell and begin to show the white tips of their furled blossoms. A transparent red haze suggests that the maple trees are thinking about leafing out.

Overhead, the arrival of migrating flocks of Canada geese and gold finches headed north offer a cacophony of sound—particularly when a flock of geese takes off from a local pond into the moonlit mists just before dawn, or, at mid-morning, when thousands of finches settle into the tall pines surrounding my cottage for a snack and some lively conversation.

Except for the occasional feathered tea party, silence settles onto the hills as we begin to plant peas, lettuce, spinach and other cold weather crops in the garden, then search for the emerging tips of fiddlehead ferns near the woodshed.

Putting my coffee cup on a nearby tree stump, I check along the sheltered side of the woodshed to see how they’re doing, then begin to pull away shredded leaves from their emerging fronds and debate sautéing them in a few days with olive oil and garlic, or bacon drippings and onion.

Up here in the mountains, the distance between winter and spring is a long, slow breath in which we renew our connection to the earth. We inhale as we brush sticks from the emerging moss, check the compost pile, or nibble on ferns—and we exhale as, in the unhurried rhythm of mountain life, the sun emerges, rainbows form, and a moose brings her new calf to nibble on the birch.

In Vermont, even in spring, blessings flow.

The crowd roared its approval.

Also at the event were US Senator Pat Leahy, D-VT, head of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and US Senator Bernie Sanders, I-VT, whose oratorical efforts on the Senate floor were the first to point out the differences between the “99 percent” of Americans who made the least money and arguably paid the most taxes, and the “1 percent” of Americans who made the most money and paid the least taxes.

US Senator Bernie Sanders, D-VT, and Wayne Michaud, director of the non-profit environmental group Idle-Free VT

Before the President arrives, US Senator Patrick Leahy listens intently to a constituent. Vermonters, who number less than a million, find it easy to share their opinions with their legislators.

What a blessing to have these men working on our behalf.

It’s still cold up here in the Vermont mountains, but already the chickadees are singing, the doves have returned to coo in the trees, and the ruffled grouse is beating a fallen log with his wings. His drumming is directed to the lady grouses in the neighborhood so they’ll know that he’s ready, willing and able to set up housekeeping once again.

Despite the occasional snow squall, everything's budding on the mountain.

Laughing at his determined rhythm, I pull my down vest a little closer, and step carefully off the deck onto the spongy grass.

This is my favorite time of year. The compost pile’s still frozen and the ground’s too wet to work. So instead of heading for the wheelbarrow and the cache of gardening tools tucked under the kitchen deck, I wander around the area sipping my coffee.

The Irish mosses under the towering red pines have already begun to green up, particularly along the path that meanders through the woods. The poplars’ gnarly branches are bursting with soft pussy-willow seedpods, buds have formed on my sturdy mountain magnolia, and the tips of what will soon be crocuses and early daffodils are beginning to emerge from around the base of a tall pine.

Putting my coffee cup down on a handy tree stump, I reach in my pocket and pull out a small sketchpad and pen to make some notes.

It’s been a hard winter, but so far things look good. Turning up the slope toward the edge of the forest, I notice that the pachysandra is starting to lose its stunned, I’ve-been-under-the-snow-for-four-months look, and is actually flowering.

The groundcover’s resilience amazes me. This particular clump of pachysandra was planted around my family home in Pennsylvania nearly 60 years ago. My aunt tended it then gave me a few cuttings when I married and moved to my first house. I’ve moved several times since, and each time I’ve left flourishing clumps of pachysandra surrounding my old house and taken a few dozen cuttings with me for the new. The clumps flowering in the snow before me are the latest offspring.

I make a few notes about transplanting some of the new shoots in a few weeks, then wander across the circular, pebbled drive toward the stone wall my husband built to separate the driveway from my beds of roses, daylilies, and peonies.

I shift a few stones back into place and search the beds for signs of life. The peonies speak to my heart. I found the first plants beside the back steps at my first house, and, like the pachysandra, I’ve moved them from house to house until they reached Vermont.

To this day they remind me of Rosalie, the next-door neighbor who took me under her wing when I was pregnant with my first child. I knew as little about caring for a child as I did about caring for a bed of peonies when we first met, but Rosalie showed me the way. The day my husband and I moved in, she turned up with a pitcher of lemonade, a plate of homemade cookies, a heart overflowing with kindness, and the conviction that God had brought us together for a reason. She helped me find a pediatrician, a church, and a diaper service, drove me to the hospital and held my hand through a near-miscarriage, and celebrated with my young husband when our baby stayed right where he was supposed to.

Once our baby was born some weeks later, Rosalie showed me how to care for him. And since the peonies had begun to push up through the cold spring earth, she showed me how to care for them, as well. Today, even though she’s hundreds of miles south, as I look out over the peony bed along the stone wall, carefully checking for any of the red shoots from what must now be a hundred different plants, I feel Rosalie’s beautiful spirit all around.

In fact, I feel the sweet spirits of many old friends surrounding me as I look around my yard. A Junco flits from branch to branch in the lilac bushes my friend Jennifer gave me a couple of years ago, then hops over to the Rose of Sharon my friend Debbie’s mom gave me a few years before she died. Both Betty and her flowering hedge were tough enough to survive the winter winds on Shelter Island, a tiny cookie of land off Long Island, but Vermont winters are another story. I make a note to ask Debbie for new cuttings next time she visits her mother’s old home.

Wandering back toward my abandoned coffee cup, the sense of peace and spiritual connection surrounding me is strong. My friends and I are hundreds and thousands of miles and even whole lifetimes apart. We are separated by time and distance, and death. But every time I loosen the dirt around one of the plants they’ve given me, every time I snip a perfect blossom, or prune a delicate branch, I feel them standing beside me.

I have been so blessed.

Named the #1 Spiritual/Inspiration Book of the Year by USA Book News

(Excerpted from Blessed: Living a Grateful Life (Readers Digest, 2011)

You left me for a month???

I left her with two dogs, a pet sitter, and the most expensive cat food on the planet. I was gone for a month. And this is what I get? I mean, who rescued whom???

Grilled meats and an amazing variety of Korean vegetables and dipping sauces.

Finally my son spotted the entrance, navigated the dark, narrow alley, then hit the brake as a valet popped out of the darkness and held up his hand. Both men chuckled as I gaped in amazement. Before us was a paved courtyard strung with twinkling lights and lined with tiny shops selling jewelry, handbags, and flowers. Laughing children, parents, grandparents, dating couples, girlfriend groups, and young men in twos and threes strolled through the courtyard and gathered in front of restaurants featuring Korean food.

The sights, sounds, and language of the Korean community swirled around us as we got out of the car and made our way toward a restaurant owned by a local folk hero. My son and I joined the group waiting in front and leaned into the smoky scents of Korean barbecue–literally a dozen different cuts of grilled beef and pork–as we waited for a table. When we finally got inside, we were seated at a round table with our own grill in the center. Servers in black t-shirts and jeans, bluetooth devices forming an almost Borg-like connection between them, swarmed around the table to grill the meats we selected and surround us with metal bowls of soups, stews, vegetables, wasabi, a saffron rice accented with lychee nuts, and a different dipping sauce for each offering.

A cocophany of sight, sound, smell and taste

Blissfully, I tried everything. One new flavor after another burst across my tongue, and I grew bolder with my choices and faster with my chopsticks.
Eventually, though, I put down my sticks, signaled for a cup of tea, and sighed with happiness. How often, I wondered, is there so much light hidden within darkness?

Grilled meat, a soy/okra dipping sauce, and kim chee

This morning, however, as sunshine ricochets around the canyon, my son and I emerge from the mountains into a morning mist that feels as though it’s a thousand years old. Wordlessly my son guides the car toward the beach, slides it into a parking space just steps from the sand, and unpacks our gear.

There are few people here. Pelicans hunt the waves in pairs, sea gulls ride currents of warm air high in the sky, and a little girl and her brother wheel and dart in and out of the surf.

My son’s attention is caught by the mood and sound of the sea. Quickly he shoots a few pictures of what seem to be a bundle of rags on the sand near the lifeguard’s station. I join him, pulling out my own camera to shoot the morning light as it breaks through the mist, blesses the waves, and overcomes the darkness.

We learn from each other.

Lunch above the cove

Seals and seabirds rest on the rocks

Moving toward my table today, I look out over the seals and seabirds basking on the rocks below and realize how much I share with these creatures. There’s something to be said for the simple life. Warmed by sun, and fed by the sea, we are truly blessed.