A Time for Every Season

I love the changing seasons! Every winter, spring, summer, and fall, is filled with its own beauty, but it also has its own rhythm and timing. As the Bible says, “For everything there is a season and a time for every purpose under heaven.” [Ecclesiastes 3:1] This is surely realized with the seasons with its yearly ebb and flow. Note how the natural pattern of nature also affects humans, if we would only allow ourselves to perceive it.

Here in the Inland Northwest spring comes with a flurry of returning birds that have been absent during the winter.  I see the towhees,robins, and bluebirds the beginning of March. In the third week of April the hummingbirds return.

Also in the third week of April I drive by the lake and look up at the osprey platform nest. Do I see one or two osprey; has one mate died and not returned? I see two! For a brief moment I feel a thrill that all is right with the world, because once again the mated osprey pair have returned to their yearly nest.

The remnant of winter snow dissolves into the earth and the ground becomes visible. Little yellow wild flowers spring up in the fields opening their pretty petals to the heavens.  By May 15 the soil is warm enough to plant a garden. The farmer’s fields are planted with wheat, mustard and hay, and the land is filled with vivid shades of green.

Everything comes alive in spring. We humans come out of our winter doldrums and smell the fresh spring air. We plant, we feel renewed, and we become active. Figuratively, we come out of ourselves and face the world; like bears and cubs emerging from their den after a long winter hibernation.

It continues to warm, and before long we are in summer. The fields begin to brown, and most of the wildflowers die. The temperature gets as high as the 90s, but is usually in the 80s. Herds of whitetail deer turn from their drab brown to a beautiful orange/red; they will remain this color throughout the summer. The garden is producing. Dry winds come and so do the grasshoppers, eating down whatever remains in the fields. The grasshoppers are abundant food for many of the birds.

Summer is a time of full expression; a time for living and doing. There is a stability about summer that encourages us to get things done.

Near the end of summer the hummingbirds have left, as have the osprey and their offspring. Many of the birds who only visit a short few summer months are also gone. In the sky flocks of Canadian geese and ducks are seen flying in their distinctive “V”. They are also leaving us, heading south.