Groundhog Day 2013

  Groundhog Day every year presents mixed feelings for me.  Of course, it is a happy day because my nephew was born on that day (today he is 34 - and counting). 

On the other hand in 2002, while training for our first half marathon, the love of my life left to "go home" during a training run with the running club.  So on the anniversary day, I have conflicted emotions.

Of course, I am not alone in missing someone.  Look at poor little Beavis.  Mom went and broke her hip on December 5 and has been MIA ever since.  He is alone in the house waiting to hear the key in the lock and then her foot steps coming in.  I am sad for him as well.



I suppose that is the "softy" in me.  I am always empathetic to the animals.  Their nature could be as a lone hunter, such as the morning visitor today in my backyard.  Some are more suited to that form of existence than others. 

Winter (at least in the Midwest) tends to force most of us to spend time inside rather than out.  The cold and snow puts all into the annual rest period - a time of rejuvenation for the coming Spring.  Still, it can be a lonely time.  Slick roads limit travel and visits with others are few and far between.

 

We look out across the landscape and wonder will the weather turn to warmth and when will we be free to roam the outside.  The predators are out there - waiting. 

Foot prints on the deck the morning and in the snow on the front steps, however, reminded me that kitties are outside as well.  I put out food just in case the hunting is not as productive as they need.  I wonder why kitties don't have homes.

It is my annual day of contemplation.  Groundhog day ... I wonder when the winter cloak will be tossed aside and bright colors reappear.

 

"Alas! must it ever be so?
Do we stand in our own light, wherever we go,
And fight our own shadows forever?"~Edward Robert Bulwer Lytton