stirrings of spring
On February 1st, the calendar flipped into a new month, but given the dark and disruptive moment at home, I wondered how February, still winter, could be any different from the cold, intense January we had experienced in DC. A Substack newsletter landed in my inbox at the right time and shifted my mindset, if only slightly; it got me to a new place with more light. The note was a reminder that through the dark winter there are shifts; each month in winter has its own characteristics. February would likely bring more snow, harm, and challenges like January, but from the first day of the month, on Imbolc, we can notice the first stirrings of spring, if we look for them. Midwinter and winter solstice, when the sun set over the Mississippi River before 5pm, are six weeks behind us, and now, we head toward the Spring Equinox.
In the dark days of January, I cheated and found light hiking under the sun, past the cacti, and up into the rocks of desert trails in Arizona. At sunrise, before flying back into the unknowns unfolding at home, in DC, I headed out onto one final trail of my trip. When I arrived at the trailhead, the moon was still above the low peak that I would climb. As I zig-zagged on the trail to reach the peak, the sun was rising from the west, warming my back, and when I took a moment to pause, catch a breath, it warmed my face as the cold morning desert temperatures, which dropped to near freezing at night, began to rise.
For the moments of January I was in DC, I drove toward the cold mountains of wild and wonderful West Virginia to surround myself in winter. In the cabin, where for two days we didn’t see another person, the snow fell outside constantly—but inside, the bathtub was filled with salts and foam, and pots of soup on the stove brought warmth. Without cell service, we avoided, as much as possible, the news from back home, which was being flooded with executive orders in horrifying contrast to the values of Martin Luther King, on the holiday that marks his legacy. The motel in Memphis where he was assassinated was fresh in my mind from a recent mid-winter trip through the South.
On the final days of January, I flew to Oaxaca, Mexico, in search of more light, but before my plane departed, there was more pain and darkness for my city of DC. As I packed a bag with sandals and light shirts for the warmth of Southern Mexico in January, I noticed a new thread had started on Reddit: “A plane has gone down in the Potomac at Reagan.” The next day, at DC’s other airport, as I left a bruised and grieving city behind, I overheard another passenger on the phone telling a friend, a loved one, the last thing they wanted to do that day was get on a plane and told the person that she had downloaded an app of the Bible to read every day for the rest of the year.
Despite the dizzying intensity of rhetoric aimed at Mexico, I found moments of brightness and joy—an important tool of resilience. As the sun set on Friday evening, at 6:22pm, we walked past the city’s cathedral and stopped in the square in front that was filled with dancers and bands celebrating a marriage. Young teenage boys dressed as large puppets of the bride and groom, and women in colorful flower dresses spun giant spheres on sticks with the name of the bride and groom. The band played, and friends and strangers clapped and danced in the square as the January light faded and the week transitioned into the weekend.
Now, in the days after Imbolc, when there is still more snow forecast, there is more light in the evenings as I step out of the metro station. Turn left, and you would reach the White House, but I turn right away from Washington into the neighborhoods of DC. Neighborhoods where people live, and Spanish speakers sell fresh fruits sprinkled with tajín and horchata on the streets near the metro stations. A few weeks ago, at that time of day, the sky would have been dark, and the sun would have disappeared by the time I’d reached the apartment, but now, as I take the bus north, the sky is still light as I head away from the federal buildings downtown into the communities that make up this city—threatened, but resilient.
