Cherry Blossom Time

Washington D.C., April 1st, 2017, Cherry Blossom Time...I get to check another one off my bucket list.  I'm really going after the bucket list this year.  Cherry Blossom time has been on the list for many years and quite by accident we got to go this year.  There was some talk of the cherry trees not having as many blooms because of a late March snowstorm and that storm did damage some of the trees but not nearly as many as had been predicted.  Of course we did not know this until we got there, so can you imagine our surprise and joy, at seeing this most amazing extravaganza of pink when we finally got to the basin. It simply filled our senses. A beautiful photo everywhere you turned. Lovely and happy people. The sun was in and out but it was warm.  I survived the metro in, but that's for another day, and more than once, I gave thanks for the beauty that surrounded us.  Yes, folks, this was what was happening in Washington D.C.  It is such a lovely realization that some things are not touched by politics but simply by nature.  The gift given to us by the Japanese. The plantings of cherry trees originated in 1912 as a gift of friendship to the People of the United States from the People of Japan. In Japan, the flowering cherry tree, or "Sakura," is an exalted flowering plant. The beauty of the cherry blossom is a potent symbol equated with the evanescence of human life and epitomizes the transformation of Japanese culture throughout the ages.  I am thankful for this gift. So for all of you who won't be able to make it to Washington...I gift you the beauty that came to us that day.

I know, this last one is not from a cherry tree...but a magnolia tree.  It speaks so much of early spring that I had to include it..

It is spring time now! While the world looks for a new war to fight, you look for a cherry blossom to watch! Let the stupid seek the violence; you seek the elegance!

Mehmet Murat Ildan

I sat with the above quote for awhile, not sure if I wanted to post that on my beautiful page.  In the end, the world is what it is.  I can't change it but on any given day, I can change myself.  I choose to look for the beauty and elegance that cannot be taken away from us.  I choose spring and re-newed faith in myself. That I will continue to live in nature and light for as long as I can...and in doing so, I will continue to knock things off my bucket list, no matter where the bucket takes me.  Courage does not mean you aren't afriad, it just means you do it anyways...how else to get to the beauty.