The Morning

How I love waking each morning, early, before the rest of the family stirs. I love the silence of the house to gather my thoughts. I love the smell of my coffee brewing and that first delightful sip hitting my lips. Mornings are my most favorite time of the day. It is the beginning, new and fresh. I love the way yesterday may have been dreadful but today has the promise of wonderful. Sometimes I choose to blog while the rest of the family sleeps. Other times I read about your lives on Facebook. In the Summer, sitting in my favorite rocking chair on my porch brings much peace. I sit near my flower gardens, observing how they are progressing and watch my bird feeders. The sounds of the mornings outside are quiet, birds chirping and my cats asking for attention. I sit with a peacefulness I find difficult to get to during the busy days. My coffee in hard, slowly wakes me, while I think about how blessed I am. My home was my parents growing up, they have both died but their presents is here, everyday I feel them, in many ways. As I look out into my yard I see my Mom gardening, I see the plants she put in so many years ago. I feel her with me and I hope she knows how much I miss her. Many mornings I "talk" to her, praying in my head, I share my thoughts with her. The yard was her joy, she loved getting dirty planting and weeding. I can see her knees covered in mud and her nails long and filthy from pulling weeds. I picture her making the plans for the plants she carefully put in throughout the yard and now I tend and add to her plan, always wondering if she likes what I do. There is barely a moment she is not on my mind in the gardens. The summer before she died, she and I walked the yard together, talking about the gardens. We got to a clematis vine that had never, in thirty years bloomed. Every year it came up and every year she and then I, were disappointed that it didn't bloom. The spring my Mom died I wandered the garden, seeing again the plants she and I had talked about. A friend of mine had told me the story of her own Mom's death and a yellow rose, her Mother's favorite flower, blooming in her garden where there had never been a yellow rose before. She took it as a sign from her Mom that she was ok, wherever she was. I told my friend, if my Mom is going to give me a sign, it will be the clematis, it will finally bloom because she and I talked about it and she knows I will understand. Well, that summer it did bloom, it wasn't magnificent, actually the flowers were kinda pitiful, but it bloomed. When I saw the flowers I knew it was a sign from my Mom because it was also her favorite color, purple. The clematis has bloomed every year since my Mom's death and it seems to be getting stronger as the flowers are more abundant. I feel my parents in my house and in my yard everyday, but it is the mornings when I feel them the most. Recently I took down an old bird feeder my Dad had made, it has sat on the top of a pole, unfilled for many, many years. There was fungus growing on the roof and it was in need of much repair. I started sanding it and discovered why it had held up all these years as the redwood began to look new again. My parents loved nature, they loved birds, animals, plants and they instilled that love in me. Taking down my Father's birdhouse, I had hoped to bring back a small part of him. It didn't take much to clean up the beautiful bird house. My Father had had great skills in wood working and it showed in this  bird house I was appreciating for the first time. After sanding it, I added a protective varnish and the redwood shinned through like it was new again, a beautiful color. After reinstalling it, high onto it's pole, I filled it and waited to see if the birds found it. I was standing it the kitchen with Mark looking out the window when I saw the first bird in my Dad's feeder. It was a cardinal, my Dad and Mom's favorite bird. It was a sign from my Dad that he is ok, helping me to see the small miracles of life. I love the mornings, the thoughts floating through my head, filling me with wonder. I love how I feel my parents, grandparents, aunts and uncles who have all passed. They are still with me, here in this house I was once a child in and now raise my own children in. The memories flood my head often of my childhood and how blessed I was. The thing is, I didn't know that as a child, running free and enjoying life. Now as a Mother, I wonder what my kids feel about their childhood's and hope someday they wake early in the quiet of the morning, knowing they were always loved. The mornings are a gift from God and every morning I feel blessed and hopeful for what lies ahead.