Springing forward

The expression "Spring forward" has always bemused me. I'm not a person who leaps from bed each morning ready to greet the day with enthusiasm and energy. So I always find this first week after we change our clocks to be a troubling one. On the one hand, I'm thrilled that it stays light later. But I definitely don't enjoy having lost the light in the morning or the feeling that it's going to take me another month to catch up on that lost hour of sleep. "Spring forward" no doubt is supposed to connote cheerfulness and pep and maybe even dancing through meadows of wild flowers, none of which I want to do at what my body feels like is an hour earlier than my eyes should be open.

What does energize me about this week, though, are the flowers and trees that are blooming. Check out the view I get to see these days as I go about my day:

The picture doesn't do justice to the beauty along this very busy road (I had limited vantage points where I could take the picture while also avoiding vehicles hurtling by at ridiculous speeds). However, in early Spring each year, this line of large and small tulip magnolia trees -- along with some large pear trees around the curve -- make a very busy road much more lovely than it might otherwise be. Following up this showy Spring display, crape myrtles will bloom in the median in equally magnificent fashion.

Isaiah mentions trees -- and other elements of nature -- breaking out in praise:

"For you will go out with joy and be led forth with peace; The mountains and the hills will break forth into shouts of joy before you, and all the trees of the field will clap their hands." -- Isaiah 55:12 (NASB)

The gorgeous profusion of blooms could very well be these tulip trees' way of breaking out in praise and clapping their hands. I'm grateful for them and for their reminder that God does want me to "Spring forward" when I praise Him.I'll leave you with a close-up shot of one of the trees in all its glory: