Springing forward.

This afternoon I smelled the earth waking up.

This morning I worked on cleaning out some junk in the old milking parlor. It was pleasant weather, but not very pleasant work, coming across Philip's old work shirt, a pair of old shoes. I wondered if it had been a hundred years since he walked around with us here on the farm. So I cried for a moment, hugged the old clothes, then put them in the get rid of stuff since we have saved a few things and don't need mounds of old clothes.

I had been putting off that task, but the bright and sunny day helped motivate me.

Then Nora and I had to take the big girls into a birthday party and I was too dirty to go shopping, so we went out to the Blue Ridge Parkway and tramped around some trails by a stream on the old Explore Park property. Back when the park was open we would go a couple of Sundays a month during pleasant weather. That was some time ago. The leaves crunched under feet and a smell of new life greeted us as we approached the stream. Brought back memories of childhood and early spring, when we would spend hours out of doors. Moss and ferns were greening up by the water. Trees were swelling with life. Nora ran ahead and at times slowed down long enough to hold my hand.

I was hoping to spend all day working on the farm, but was able to give thanks for a couple of hours to tramp around with my daughter. A gift. We saw daffodils in town. And lots of lemony forsythia. And felt sunshine on our cheeks as our hearts pumped.