This morning I woke up listening to legos bang together and thanked God for a gray sunrise. There are a few benefits to having these dull, gray, peasoup fog mornings, and one of them is that it convinces my daughter that it is earlier than it really is. Today that meant that I was able to close my eyes again and bury my face in the pillow for a few more minutes. Just a few minutes. That's not too much to ask, is it, and those extra minutes can mean the difference between being forced to consciousness and a foul mood for the next twenty hours or a slow rise to acceptance that yes, I have to open my eyes and tend to my family.

I do love them. That is why I accept the forced waking when it's needed. That is also why I have yet to run away from home.

Sunday night on my way out of the NICU I had a flashback to college days. I remembered what it was like to walk outside just after sunset in chilly wet weather, walking from building to building and climbing endless half-flights of concrete steps under equally chilly flourescent lighting. The ground is wet in the manner of springtime; petunias still survive in their flowerbeds and the rain is keeping everything just ready to explode with new growth. In another week I'm going to be hearing lawn mowers everywhere we go, and smelling that heavenly aroma of newly clipped grass.

It will be February, and seem like May in the small Eastern town where I grew up. Late April, even, but surely not the middle of winter. I'm experiencing seasons again after three years in Paradise and although I surely do miss that land of no real climate and timeless season I'm learning to accept the slow progression of time again. The land wakes up, is moist, grows. The mowers come, new sounds and smells. Summer lands hard on our heads with an equally endless time of oven-like heat as we're all baked dry and dream of water. Fall brings cooler nights and our thanks. Winter comes again with rain and fog and slow gray mornings.