I can tell that the calendar is getting ready to turn over into the warmer months, even though there still are times when the seasons seem confused.

The flowers and trees are starting to green up and everything seems to be coming to life after a long sleep.

This is my favorite time of the year, when the green shoots burst forth and become leaves where only twigs were before, when the radiant color of flowers and their fragrances fill the senses and the laughter of children playing outside wafts through the air.

Certainly, some of these things might happen on through summer and fall, but it isn't the happening that really matters. It is the fact that we have all lived in the grip of winter for so long and can now come out of our annual hibernation.

I enjoy winter more than most people, but not for the cold or the snow, although those are fine by me. It is for the variety. Without winter, summer could not be appreciated. Just ask someone who lives along the equator. In other words, if we never saw the bare silence of winter, with the icy grip of the naked trees seeming to hold fast to the skyline, we could never truly appreciate the warmth of a beautiful spring day.

If it ever stops raining long enough to dry out the soil, I want to get out into the garden and fire the tiller. Both the old one and the new one are now in good working order; the former despite an earlier carburetor operation that left it ill for some time.

It wheezes along, occasionally taking a break to spit and sputter before roaring back to life. That tiller is kind of like any antique tool, it has a distinctive personality that makes it unique. Even though it sometimes proves to be more trouble than it's worth, it has provided years of faithful service and deserves to grow a bit contrary in its old age.

The newer tiller that I purchased last season is too big to go between the rows, so the old one is usually relegated to that task.

As for what I was saying earlier about the winter and spring, I always try to take the good with the bad. But more than that, the good needs the bad for purposes of contrast. If everyone smiled all the time, smiling would be without meaning. The contrast in life is what really makes it worthwhile. We can each choose which we prefer, the dark or the light, the cold or the hot, the clear or the opaque.

Some just choose to be somewhere in the middle — grey, lukewarm and semi-translucent. Those are the folks I understand the least. To me, that is the equivalent of a life full of cloudy days. One has to rise above the clouds in order to get a better perspective on things.

You know, I have always heard that the one constant in life is change. While that statement kind of strikes me as an oxymoron, I can really see how true it is. I know from personal experience that things can change dramatically in just an instant. Thank goodness that doesn't happen very often. Usually those are the times when we learn the most. Sometimes, that's the only way we can learn a valuable lesson. Other times, like the frost last May zapping my garden, lessons seem hard to come by.

I suppose the lesson is that we aren't in control, we just have to ride the waves as they come our way.

I usually try to focus on what really matters — my spirituality, my family, my friends, my job and my other hobbies and interests. Among those I can find everything I need.

I suppose that it is the American way to want things we don't have, usually, advertisements say, because "we deserve it." But that statement always worries me, since if I use logic to say I want every good thing I deserve, shouldn't I conversely get all the bad things I deserve also? I don't think many people would take that deal if they put much thought into it.

Therefore, I will be content waiting for the weather to break and the ground to dry enough to be tilled. It sounds mundane to some I suppose, but for me, it is a pleasure.

If you're trying to get everything you want in this life, then just want what you have, I can hear my father saying. I know more about what he meant all the time.

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