In another blog post I have shared before that yearly i choose a word that seems to come to me willy nilly, but that serves as a focal point as I live out the days and seasons of the current year. My word for 2023 was SURPRISE. I kept track of each “surprise’” as it came to me and at year’s end, had ample evidence that many delightfully unexpected things had come my way that provided food for thought as well as gratitude as I reckoned with another year that had passed. In turn I felt nudged this year to expand on the notion of surprises and in a deeper way pay attention to people and things that come unexpectedly, but this time to let myself be astonished by them! My word for 2024 is born: astonish…

Today it surprrises me more than a little that not only is half of February gone by already, but so is this hibernating, hunker-down season of Winter!! The first day of Spring (Equinox-wise anyway) is only 13 days from now! Outside my window is the husky sound of wind that just won’t give up. The tarp on our wood pile barely holds on, and the Amazon driver lost his hat walking up my drive. What I feel moved to do today as I sit by my wood stove fire is create a list of things in general that astonish me; thereby giving me a jump start on paying attention to this year’s “word.” I share that list below:

It astonishes me…

• how quickly the canvas bag of wood keeps needing to be refilled

• that a cup of peppermint tea can touch my soul this way

• that so many drive through red lights these days

• how much a new car costs

• that my lemon verbena returns every Spring after 36 years of planting it

• that my grandson is going to be a daddy

• how easier it is to gain pounds than to lose them

• that a baby’s smile can completely turn your day around

• how much it hurts when a loved one dies

• that winter knows it must give in to Spring

• how I still am excited about the Red Sox at spring training even after a disastrous season

• our first-born daughter turns 47 next week

WHAT ASTONISHES YOU???????

Just putting together such a list is soul-food on this gloriously windy February afternoon…

Last month I announced that this year my monthly posts would each include a poem as I work toward a 2nd book on the seasons, this one in poetry form…

IN DEEPEST WINTER

My seeds keep finches warm at noon

So hard to fly in this slanting wind

Even clenched beaks let a couple kernels fall

Rogue sunflowers in June