8 MARCH 2023 ANTICIPATION

I await springtime with the same fervor that a child waits for Christmas morning. Turn me loose in a garden center and I am like a kid in a candy store. Give me the opportunity to talk about swans and I light up like a Christmas tree. I used to think gardening was my passion. I moved to the country in early 2000 so that I could garden and write – and have swans. When I was led to the swans at Airlie, in Virginia, they took precedence over my gardening. Working with the swans; however, opened up an even larger world for me, where I learned about other species, their habitats (and the disappearance of those habitats) and climate change. This elevated my gardening to a new level – one in which gardening for wildlife became my primary focus. My love for gardening had led me to swans – and the swans led me back to gardening. Both gave me a whole new perspective for my writing. From there, I was guided to permaculture, which I am just as passionate about. My passions have grown, merged, and expanded to encompass this entire planet.

It is the time of year when young swans, of about four years of age, are pairing up to nest for the first time; and older, seasoned couples begin to refurbish their nests from the previous year, to prepare for raising another brood of cygnets. Their mating calls fill the air, joined by that of other species preparing to reproduce as well. This is an exciting time of year. Soon, I will be privy to migrating bird species dropping in at my bird feeders to refuel, on their way to their breeding grounds. Occasionally, I can look up into the sky to see and hear flocks of birds on migration. This is the anticipation of spring. This can also be a busy time of starting seeds indoors and waiting anxiously for them to germinate.

It has been a long, cold, and relentless winter which shows no signs of moving out of the way of spring. But, as a gardener and a lover of wildlife, the anticipation is in my DNA. I have not only the hopes, but the knowing, that spring will come.