Recently, the weather hasn’t seemed to know what to do with itself. There’s snow on the ground while the sun is shining, and it’s getting warmer outside, while cold breezes still blow around. It’s almost as if nature is stuck in some bizarre in between season, where it’s not quite spring yet, but not winter anymore, either.
I look forward to spring every winter. I look forward to the snow melting, the sun coming out earlier, and the flowers popping up out of the ground. But before these things can happen, winters has to end. The cold weather has to recede, allowing the snow to warm the world and coax life out of the barren trees and hard ground.
When I go outside, sometimes I close my eyes and try to imagine what it will feel like when the cold is gone, and warmth has taken it’s place. When grass covers my yard rather than snow. And I find it oddly difficult to grasp. I know it will happen, and yet it’s hard for me to believe. Winter can’t last forever, and eventually it will be spring, and then summer, and then fall and winter again. However, while I’m feeling the stinging wind on my cheeks and seeing the ice chunks frozen to the ground, that promise seems distant.
In many ways, that situation very greatly explains my life right now. I’m nearing the end of eighth grade, and I can almost feel high school on it’s way, but the thought of actually going to high school seems like it’s a long way away, if it will ever even happen. In a strange way, I know that it will happen, but it just doesn’t feel real yet.
Our teachers keep telling us not to leave eighth grade behind just yet. They tell us to work hard here, and end strong. That’s not the problem for me. The problem for me is seeing the light at the end of the tunnel. It’s remembering that this won’t last forever, and soon I’ll have a whole new set of problems to worry about. High school problems.
I guess in both situations, the solution is to hang on. Keep the promise of the future in your mind, and don’t forget that time is always moving, and always changing. Don’t give up on the present, but don’t dismiss the future either, as both are equally important. As much as it might feel like it, time is still moving, and we still have a life to live now, a life that consists of more than merely trudging along waiting for the future to come. Remember that winter only lasts while there’s snow on the ground, and inevitably, spring will arrive. See you next week!
“Reprinted from Hagel Publications, Inc. dba as Courier Newspapers”