This week we have been part of an almost imperceptible shift, but one that registers deeply. We have tipped the mid-way between the winter equinox and the spring solstice, and the light is finally on our side. In sun that fingers over the hill before coffee time and in the weight of darkness that is now in retreat. Afternoons that are no longer curtailed by gloom and evenings that start at six make all the difference in how we use the day. 

Just a week ago the snowdrops down by the stream were barely nosing through leaf mould. Visible only when you walked amongst them as clutched fingers holding tightly onto buds, the growth has been slow and epitomised my yearning for movement. But this first week of February their energy has been on the move, the flowers pushed and all at once luminous so that you can see them as you look down from the house. A bright ribbon that represents hours of obsessive dividing and imagining this very break on winter’s hold. I followed the trail from the lowest point in our land just this morning, walking upstream, with the light behind me to show them at their best and planned this year’s divisions that can now begin to extend its reach and influence upon the season.