Winter is lingering longer than I expected.
Spring is nineteen days away, and normally by now I would have seen the signs. The small purple crocus pushing through cold soil. The white daffodils that always seem to arrive quietly but reliably. Those early signals that something is shifting beneath the surface, even if the air still feels sharp.
This year, they have not appeared.
I find myself scanning the ground more than usual, as if watching will somehow hurry the season along.
At the same time, I am heading into surgery. A hysterectomy. Even writing the word feels weighty, though not dramatic. Just real. It marks a transition I knew would come eventually, but knowing something intellectually and living it physically are very different things.
I am aware that the full emotional impact has not landed yet. I suspect it won’t be until after the surgery, when the logistics are over, and the body begins to recalibrate. For now, the feelings are present but indistinct. There is something there, a heaviness, a tenderness, but I cannot narrow it down into one clean emotion.
There is sorrow in letting go, even if I cannot clearly define what I am grieving. There is the quiet recognition that this is the closing of a chapter. There is an understanding that the body I have lived in for decades is about to change permanently. Even when a decision is right and necessary, it can still carry loss.
At the same time, I have stepped into a new season of learning.
The timing feels almost ironic. On one hand, I am preparing for surgery and recovery. On the other, I am stretching creatively in ways that feel expansive and demanding. Everything feels big at once. Physically. Emotionally. Creatively. And yet, externally, everything feels still.
The yard looks frozen. The air remains cold. My usual signs of spring have not emerged. It feels as though the world is holding its breath.
There is a sense of standing at the edge of change while everything appears unchanged. A quiet suspension. A waiting.
Part of me feels overwhelmed. I catch myself thinking, Who am I to take on something new right now? Who am I to step into deeper creative learning when I still struggle to grasp the basics of building a mood or inspiration board in a way that feels cohesive? It all feels vast. Complex. Bigger than my current capacity.
There are moments when I feel in over my head.
It is a strange place to stand, knowing without doubt that this is the path, while simultaneously feeling small within it. The certainty and the insecurity coexist. I do not question the direction. I question my readiness.
But maybe readiness is not something that arrives.