Spring Forward!

I got a big fat birthday present this morning.Even though my birthday always falls on the greyest, grimmest day of the year, this morning was truly special–the Monday after an idyllic, two week March break vacation to Argentina (more on that later), which came, deliciously, on the tail on a two-month whirlwind of travel that I have come to view as my mini-sabbatical.

Back to life, back to work, back to reality and the rest of my existence–now even shorter and more grim thanks to the arrival of another birthday.

And yet, much as spring comes around again after every long winter (and today is also the vernal equinox!), hope springs eternal. This morning I woke to the picture of buds peeking out on the bare trees outside my window. And even more hopefully, the news, on the front page of the newspaper, that my man, Obama, has, despite the horrendous and frighteningly idiotic spew of vitriol and noise from those who would cynically seize liberty from tyranny as their flag to undermine what should only logically and morally be the right of any citizen in such a prosperous nation as the United States of America, delivered on the change he promised by pushing through a health-care plan.

Yes, it is horribly compromised. But is still an enormous victory, and the kind of significant, real change we all desperately hoped for when we were so inspired by President Obama during his amazing and historic campaign.

So that was my birthday gift–hope, and the possibility of change.

Well that–and a beautiful Argentine weaving that now graces the worn red sofa in our family room, a lovely cymbidium to add to our growing “orchidarium”–and most amazingly, a beautiful vintage tin that my darling son Philip found for me on a shopping mission after his first day back at school that now sits on my kitchen counter like a prize I’ve won.

Take that, grey March Monday.