Report From PIA – November 21
Although still plagued by a heavy-duty head cold that had me feeling totally sorry for myself, I spent a few minutes in the garden today. Most of the time I was keeping my husband company, i.e. watching him work. But before coming into the house to be closer to my tissues, I stopped to look at the rain garden.
The Japanese Anemones, filled with seedpods that were just beginning to burst, caught my eye and I sat down on a log to watch them.
In late November it’s tempting to feel gloomy: the annuals and perennials are mostly gone, the weather will soon be colder, and it seems like it’s getting dark by four o’clock. Mercifully, these puffs of Anemone seed start me thinking about the grace of the seasons.
The changes in weather and landscape draw my attention to the outside world. That greater awareness of, and appreciation for, nature recalls one of the definitions of grace: elegance and beauty of movement or expression. It’s all around me in the garden, and the seasons remind me to wake up and drink it all in.
Grace is also defined as “a state of sanctification by God”, and looking at these seasonal changes, I feel holiness here. These puffs of seed epitomize the circle of life, and the blessing of an ending also being a beginning.
We also know grace to be a short prayer of thankfulness, and being called to pay attention, to witness the miracle of new beginnings as we see this season end, fills me with gratitude.
As I watched, many of these seeds started taking flight.
The Anemone seeds are an elegant poem of a package, waiting to fly through winter on the way to spring.
