Well, after all the rain and misery of Rome, it was very nice to come home. Funny that I think of it that way now. I have three homes. I have Montana, which is the home of my heart. I have Texas, which is the home of my life. And now, I have Quedlinburg, which is the home of right now.
We are having more and more sunny days and little flowers are peeking out everywhere. Spring has always been my favorite time of year because out of the dreary ugliness of the end of winter, comes new beginnings with bright colors and the smell of flowers and growing things. Spring is a reminder of life and the act of being alive.
I went for a walk the day before yesterday to go buy nail glue, of all things, and instead of getting nail glue, I ended up going on a nice long walk. I walked a direction I hadn’t gone before and saw things I hadn’t seen before. I found a statue or a conglomeration of statues. I saw the little purple, white, and yellow flowers poking through the dead (right now) grey vines. I saw happy bunches of daffodils smiling at the sky. It was a beautiful walk.
Along the path I took, I came across a place where a little foot bridge crossed a small rivulet of river water, my grandfather would have called it a crick (vernacular for creek.). There were mallards there, diving to the bottom in search of munchies and the females were gathering twigs and branches and such. Growing up where I did, mallards mean spring. Yet another colorful reminder that things are changing and the earth is coming into another stage of rebirth.
Further on from the water, I found a small park where families were gathered playing with soccer balls, climbing a small jungle gym, and playing tag. Little groups of moms with babies spotted the grass and all the parents were very very attentive to the older children. Attentive at the least, very involved in playing mostly.
I kept walking eventually circling back to a familiar route, enjoying the colorful flowers in window boxes, the small buds sprouting on tree branches, and the leafing ivy climbing fence posts and walls. I imagine it will be stunning here when Spring is in full swing.
Yesterday I went for the same walk, but this time I took my camera and incidentally, I also ended up with my nail glue. 
I walked down to the post office, dropped off my post cards and headed down the same road as I had the day prior. The first thing I saw in the way of growth was an Ivy in leaf climbing a fence post. Next, I came across my statue.
Soon after my statues…literally right across the street, the definitive signs of Spring were abundant. All sorts of flowers were blooming. Have I mentioned how happy Spring makes me?
This blog is probably going to be mostly photos, but I really can’t help how happy Spring makes me. Germany reminds me so much of Montana. I find myself hoping they have lilacs and snowball bushes. I actually walk around in anticipation of the smell of the lilacs in the air and I have an abundant eagerness to rush outside to cut the blooms off and bring their scent inside. I think my favorite smell in the entire world is lilac bushes in bloom. I love how they aren’t open when I go to bed and it seems like the next morning the whole world smells good. I remember all of the bushes we had around our house when I was a kid. There was a big roundish one in the middle-ish of our very large backyard and it was growing up right next to the snowball bush and the three of us would sometimes hide in between the two while playing hide and seek or forts.
Snowball bushes are exactly what they sound like. A bush with big balls of white flowers that smell good but look exactly like fluffy snowballs.
I remember so clearly the tulips and daffodils bursting through the leftover undergrowth in the beds around our porch. I recall wondering which colors they would be because I couldn’t remember from the year prior and there were so many options. I remember how surprised I was to learn there were different types of daffodils. I love the small ones with the crumpled orange and reddish petals in the middle.
I am so excited to watch Spring happen here. Growing up it meant more fun. It meant growing things in our pots at my grandma’s house. It meant the smell of earth being turned in the front yard, where we would plant pansies, petunias, salvia, and so many other blooming plants. It meant that there was time to play outside and to go to the parks. It meant that the duck pond would thaw and the ducks and geese would come back and we could feed them again and walk around the pond looking for turtles and goldfish. Spring meant newness.
I like to think of life in the same way as I think of Spring. We go through these periods of stagnation where it seems as if everything is standing still, nothing is changing, and there is a wall preventing progress. Those times are our winters. When times are hard, when sad or even bad things happen, when forward progress is an impossibility because we are too busy just dealing with today. Our Spring is when we get to move on. We get to rediscover the world. We get to wash away those months/days/years of bad air and stagnation and we get to walk out into the sun. we get to forgive ourselves and we get to forgive others. We get to say goodbye to past hurts. We get to start over.
Spring was when I got to be closest to my mom. I think she loved it as much as I did and if not, I never knew. I loved getting my hands dirty planting flowers with her. I loved our discovery of the Missouri primrose that bloomed just as the sun was going down each evening. I remember standing there with her and watching the petals unfurl. It was magical.
I remember the daisy hill in the back yard. It wasn’t really a hill, more a bump. I think it became the daisy hill because it was a pain to mow. Regardless, every year my mom transplanted bunches of daisies from all over the yard onto this little hill. Eventually it was covered with nodding heads, waiting to be “love me, love me not-ed".” We had this great cat, Mini. In the summer we would fasten his halter to the clothesline and he had the run of the yard. He always slept or stalked imaginary prey (and sometimes not so imaginary) on the daisy hill. When he passed away, he was buried there.
Spring is magical to me. I am beyond thrilled that it is coming to Quedlinburg. In this instance, I am very pleased that my plans to live in Cairo were averted to coming here. Spring doesn’t spring the same way in more southern regions and I get to experience it again, here, for the first time in nearly 12 years.
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