It's Happening Again: A Reflection on Spring

It's happening again now, right outside my window. I hadn't really noticed until this morning, when I woke to the kind of clean sunlight that changes the way we see things. I looked out the window to the trees, and I noticed the world outside is beginning to renew itself the way it does every Spring. I was glad to see it. Around here this year, after a long cold season, we earned our Spring.

People renew themselves, too, after the seasons they experience. I don't know how many cold seasons I have had in my life, seasons that were hard, bleak, long, or bitter, but I know every cold season of my life has been followed by a Spring. Even now at forty, I can still look forward to the new growth to come. I welcome it.

Spring cleaning means opening windows and airing out the house. It means touching up the yard, painting the deck, cleaning up inside and outside, and making things work that have sat untouched for months. This year for me it also means doing something about the size of my belly. I may not want to face it, but it's time for a renewal of the body.

Many of you know I returned to the classroom to teach this year after six years doing some other crazy thing, and I have enjoyed the renewal that this change brought to my life. Professionally and personally I have had to renew myself, and the result is new growth. I have had to figure things out and solve problems that didn't exist when I taught before. I have had to read new books and write new papers and think new thoughts along with my students. I am so glad I made that change. It has been a great renewal of the mind.

The Easter Season is upon us, and in the Christian churches around here and everywhere, the faithful will soon mark the death of Christ on Good Friday, and then, after three days, on Easter Sunday, The Resurrection. With this event Christians are brought once again into the great promise of the faith, and that is there is no end to renewal when you choose to rise with Christ. In Jewish temples, and in homes, around the Seder table, the faithful will celebrate Passover, a remembrance that God kept his promise (through Moses) to the Jewish people to free them from captivity in Egypt. Easter for Christians, just like Passover for Jews, is a chance for a great renewal of the spirit.

Wherever this spring finds you in mind, in body, and in spirit, may the season of renewal find you, and along with it the beginning of new growth in your life. Say what you want about Michigan and its tough winters, Spring is a gift both inside and out. Enjoy what is beginning to happen again, right outside your window, too.

Note: This blog post is from a series originally published as personal essays written for the Van Buren County Advertiser from 2008-2014 by Corey Harbaugh under the title It's All Good. The It's All Good columns were written to feature and celebrate life in and around Gobles, Michigan.