Breaking Dormancy

It is nearly the end of March. And a cold, wet, gloomy & rheumy one as well. My spirits have been as low as the weather, and from what I hear around me, many of us are also feeling the same way, at least here in the Pacific Northwest where La Nina has presented us with yet another ugly spring. These are hard times for healers and our clients alike, as we all struggle to emerge from the cold, stagnant, closed-in days of a fading winter....

And yet...

• Last week we had a rare sunny day; by afternoon the temperature had climbed into the high fifties. I went outside WITHOUT A COAT and sat on the south-facing deck. I was basking in the golden sunlight, feeling a little like a hot biscuit all slathered with melting butter, sliding down onto the wooden bench. Around me a newly emerged Yellow-faced bumblebee queen flew in circles, checking out the crocus blossoms in our yard and then methodically searching the garden soil Glen had just dug up for possible abandoned mouse holes to nest in.

• And then there are the Bewick’s Wrens. This is a nondescript, sneaky little brown bird that lives year around in Northwest gardens; you might not even know they were around except they have a wide range of vivid, piercing songs.
I was sitting by the front window, looking gloomily out at the gray & rain, when up popped a pair of them in the mock orange bush next to the glass. They were clearly a mated pair, sitting very close to each other, gleaning bugs and also clearly picking through the moss for bedding for a nest they were building.
The wren was a sacred animal to the Celtic peoples of the Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Tom Cowan, a noted shamanic healer and Celtic scholar, writes this about the wren: “In the depths of winter, in the cold thrall of bitter weather, the wren sings. Alone among birds, the wren’s voice slides across joyful notes while nature is otherwise somber and silent. And in her song she reminds us of the beauty of spring, the mating calls of other birds who return in warmer days, the brightness of ever earlier dawns when all the world turns green again.” As I read this passage and remember the pair of wrens at my window, I realize how effective they are in lifting the gloom of winter, and reminding me that green spring is surely on its way.

• Then yesterday in a rare break from the rain I walked around to the sunny side of the house to check out my medicinal herb garden. I hadn’t looked at my plants for months, and was greatly heartened by what I saw. Both the rue and the helichrysum, native to warm southern Mediterranean lands, had survived the winter, a little beaten up to be sure, but still alive. At the base of last year’s dead fennel stalks, vigorous green shoots of new fennel are bursting through. And the mugwort, queen of my garden who is often slow to awake, has pushed through some vigorous green stalks of growth.

All of this makes a difference. I feel warmer, the blood moving more strongly through my veins. The cranky cold aches & pains of winter are subsiding, and I feel more energy pushing through, much like the stalks of mugwort pushing out of the cold ground. My spirits are lifting, and I once again find joy in the sight of the bumblebee, coming back to life after months in the cold ground. All around me, life is finding its way. And I , too, am breaking dormancy...


Janet Partlow

Resources:
• Wren photo by Nancy Partlow; all others by Janet Partlow
• Tom Cowan website www.riverdrum.com “Reviving the Wren”