My bookbinder friends brought the pig back from a trip to Mexico in a winter colder than this, a year when spring refused to begin. Watching for spring indicators, needing to make the foldbooks, I was in a work stall. The pig, all folk art decorated blue, got me going.
The inhospitable weather these March days reminds me of then. Outdoors the wind chills, but indoors the sun cheers. In March I think about the sun verbs: pouring, flooding, streaming. How we are enveloped, soaked, awash with light. And we get filled up – with warmth and with energy.
Light and energy are inseparable in my mind. I’m grateful for the sun pouring in these mornings – in spite of a ten-minute hail pass-by. Blue sky to the south but it’s hailing here, collecting on car, bouncing on birdbath, rat-a-tatting on metal roof, pellets sliding down skylights. And just as quickly as begun – stopped. Sun hot on the back of my head.
Frances is an indicator of weather outside – on really bright days she sleeps in a puddle of sun on the end of the bed with her paws over her eyes, on windy days which chill the house, she tucks those paws under her breast.
Like a northern house needs to do, this one reaches for all the available light. The brightness from windows is doubled as sun streams through panes, forming grid pattern shadows on the floor. My workroom faces south and is saturated with abundant March light. Feeling rich, I shut out all but the glow through shades, to dampen the white paper glare. As the length and strength of light expands, so does capacity for work.
And – a sunbathing pig is a sign of spring.
her spirits rose... 