Christ's Triumph and a Marian Blossom

Christ is Risen! He is truly Risen, Alleluia! We have spent the last weeks feasting and enjoying the joys that come at Eastertime - abundance after famine, so to speak, in big and little ways. Our oldest boy was here for a couple of beautiful weeks, making the house seem whole again and filling our happy cups to overflowing. And never before had hot coffee, cinnamon rolls, and bacon tasted so good as on Easter Sunday morn after trying Lenten days, the sufferings of Holy Week, and the final long and holy Vigil night. The late frosts and violent storms have given way to Spring - embodying the life Christ's glorious Resurrection brings.
 
Earlier in Lent, I had begged the Blessed Virgin to save our fig trees whose early foliage, among many other shrubs and trees, had been killed off in a freeze. For weeks I lamented the bare and blackened branches behind Our Lady in the garden, then one day we saw that little green buds were once again emerging. Whether the trees will bear fruit remains to be seen, but at least the boughs will be green - a timely and revivifying balm for the soul after each dark and cold winter. Also, the puppy had destroyed the first blooming rose that had come just in time for Easter; in the moment it was hard to see that "this too shall pass" - and yet, as my husband had predicted, another bud blossomed in all its delicate beauty - a wonderful, fleeting nature's gold we should cherish while it lasts. Relatedly, we have taken in a baby buckling goat this week, bottle feeding and caring for this wee little thing that we hope will help us to expand our goat adventure in the future. Remember that instead of hoped-for kids we got baby chicks last year? At the moment it is good to reflect that, even if none of our best ideas ever come to perfect fruition or at the time we expect or desire, the best fruits tend to come a bit unexpectedly, and anyway the virtues that come of hard work and prayerful, faithful labor make everything worthwhile. 

A primary part of our Easter celebrations manifested in our annual St. George Fest - a day of praying, feasting, good-natured competition (in an obstacle course race), a St. George play, music, and smore's. This year the weather was perfect - the sun shone and the skies were blue and the surroundings verdant - there were no big injuries and there were no insects to be seen. Children and adults ran the course in good cheer, traversing trails, climbing over the wall, splashing through the shallow waters of the creek, crawling through tunnels, throwing axes, hauling tree trunks, shooting arrows, running the pine-cone-bomb gauntlet, and finally thrusting a pine-pole spear into the dreaded dragon (the mulch pile) to finish. While we celebrate Christ's ultimate triumph over death, we emulate His models in figures like St. George, who took up the cross and vanquished the evil of his day. There is always a sublime balance in the fallen world; no longer in Eden, we mustn't let our guard completely down. The Church implores us to shout with joy and in the same moment to spurn all that is hostile to Christ. The happiness of the world is not the joy of heaven, may we be graced to discern the difference! And our glad moments and victories here are to be tempered in knowledge that it is all for His glory, not our own. Non nobis Domine, we sing. Sed nomini, tuo da Gloriam!
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We look forward to our next gathering soon, in honor of Mary in the month of May. A processional litter on which to carry her statue will be covered with flowers to honor her, the Mother filled with grace, who ever points and leads us to the Savior. Today, that single soft-pink rose salutes her, and provides a lesson enough for the day.