The signs are all there now, the crocuses are blossoming, random garlic is coming up.  I say random because I didn’t plant any last fall so there must have been bulbs that I missed.  A pleasant surprise.  The leaves are coming out on my strawberries which I had given up for lost since they had been totally taken over last year.  I figured it being their first year they had been choked out.  It gives me an opportunity to weed all around them and mulch, we’ll see what happens.  No asparagus yet but the rhubarb is coming out of the ground.

The robins are back and I have to tell you there is nothing like hearing their sweet, sweet song.  I always forget how much I miss it until I hear it. There is no more obvious a harbinger of spring for me.

Sugaring is over, the last boil was this past Sunday.  I was afraid I was going to miss it altogether and had threatened to boil syrup on the stove to make sugar just so I could smell it.  The syrup made over the weekend was my favorite, dark and robust as the grading system now tells you.  If I’m going to eat maple syrup I want it to really taste like maple.

Things here are coming back down to a new normal.  Everything was in place so the transfer of property was seamless.  My father’s name has been taken off of everything.  The utilities don’t make anything easy to transfer but in my mind I figure if it all takes a month that’s okay.

Dad’s memorial service is next week.  The last thing to be taken care of.  Looking through hundreds of photographs over the past few days has given me a greater understanding of what it means to have a good life.  Sometimes he didn’t see it but he was charmed.

We all need to look through our lives like they are photographs I think.  We only take pictures of the good things.  The big family events – births, weddings, graduations.  Vacations or jobs well finished.  When it all comes right down to it it’s the little moments that make up that whole grand life. When I go I want someone to look at the snapshots and say, “Wow, her life was pretty great.” I know I feel as though it has been and I think it’s because I can drop the bad stuff by the wayside.

Live for the moment, don’t dwell on the past, you can’t change any of it.  Just remember all of the little gifts because that is what a good life is made of.