Daffodils

And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

It's really brutally cold outside this evening, with strong winds and the kind of cold that seeps into your bones, the bones in your hand, the ones that ache for a long time after getting so cold.

But, in the bed of the now-invisible hostas, I can see tiny green tips -- the miniature daffodils that Landscape Guy and I moved this summer -- poking bravely up through the dirt. And, then, my heart with pleasure fills.

One of the best things about gardening is the anticipation. The watching for tiny signs. For me, this has a lot to do with being in relationship with a specific piece of land. It's trite, but true:

And then he added:
"go and look again at the roses.
You will understand now
that yours is unique in all the world.
Then come back to say goodbye to me,
and I will make you a present of a secret."

The little prince went away,
to look again at the roses.
"You are not at all like my rose," he said.
"As yet you are nothing.
No one has tamed you, and you have tamed no one.
You are like my fox when I first knew him.
He was only a fox
like a hundred thousand other foxes.
But I have made a friend,
and now he is unique in all the world."
And the roses were very much embarrassed.
"You are beautiful, but you are empty," he went on.
"One could not die for you.
To be sure, an ordinary passerby would think
that my rose looked just like you
--the rose that belongs to me.
But in herself alone she is more important
than all the hundreds of you
other roses: because it is she that I have watered;
because it is she
that I have put under the glass globe;
because it is for her
that I have killed the caterpillars
(except the two or three we saved
to become butterflies);
because it is she that I have listened to,
when she grumbled,
or boasted,
or even sometimes when she said nothing.
Because she is MY rose."


And he went back to meet the fox.
"Goodbye" he said.

"Goodbye," said the fox.
"And now here is my secret, a very simple secret:
It is only with the heart that one can see rightly;
what is essential is invisible to the eye."

"What is essential is invisible to the eye,"
the little prince repeated,
so that he would be sure to remember.

"It is the time you have wasted for your rose
that makes your rose so important.


More here.

What's pushing up through your frozen ground? Are you grounding often enough to know?