Plum Blossom Awe

photo by: Jelleke Vanooteghem

Have you ever noticed the way early morning sunlight dances across pink plum blossoms in early spring? I caught a glimpse of that dance out my kitchen window this morning, and I let the beauty take my breath away. 

I’d been in the midst of my morning routine, making my breakfast smoothie, putting away last night’s dishes, thinking about my “to do list” for the day. The pink caught me first, out of the corner of my eye. So much around is still brown when the plum blossoms come on. They’re the first of the flowering fruit trees here in the Northwest. The color is distinct, like burst of happiness in the surrounding landscape. 

A few minutes later, the sunlight hit, stopping me again, magnifying the beauty ten-fold. Gazing from my window, I fully stopped and took it in, letting beauty and gratitude wash over me. 

In… this moment…. I am…. alive…. and present…AWAKE.

I feel my heart expand. A tingle of delight spreads from that expansion through my chest, shoulders and arms. I’m aware of my feet on the floor, and the earth beneath the maple floorboards. I extend imaginary roots down into the earth and through the soil, letting them connect with the roots of the plum tree in my neighbor’s yard, and with the little crabapple tree by my front door that will be blooming before long. I feel into the mycelial network that accompanies the roots. 

I am no longer a woman alone in her kitchen getting ready for another day of doing. I am part of this living, breathing earth organism. A vital part. Experiencing the awe and wonder of that dance of morning sunlight across the pink plum blossoms.