Small glimmers of light, days of sun in the midst of ongoing wintry weather.

Early morning. I’m sleepy after waking early to the cat’s cries, cat feet treading up my body, cat nose sniffing my face. I get up, make the coffee, and lounge on the couch. At the bird feeder out front, cardinals, wrens, finches dart in and out and sometimes perch, waiting their turn.

Afternoon. Lunch with friends on a bright day. We want to sit outside but there are no tables available so we sit on a glassed in porch, looking out at the brightness, the sun, the wind. In a few months there will be flowers. Now the people are flowers, families, lovers, friends turning their faces to the sun. We talk, I dip my cheese laden bread into tomato soup, drink iced lemon ginger tea. We walk back to our cars, wind whipping my hair across my face, pause by our cars to continue the conversation, wind, sun, friends.

Later another friend and I head out for a walk but are stopped by the wind, stronger now, requiring effort to walk into it. Still bright. Still sun. We detour to a garden shop. Look at row after row of plants, tender, small, green, earth smelling. We think about buying pansies but decide to wait. My friend buys a basil plant, thinking summer, thinking tomatoes, thinking pesto. On to another garden store, the pull toward summer strong in us now. We buy dahlia tubers, imagining strong stems, big blossoms, bouquets on porch tables. Last year the rabbits ate my dahlias when they first came up but I’ll try again and if I end up feeding the rabbits, so be it.

What dazzles me? I want to say life dazzles me. I can feel those words forming in my fingertips, ready to appear on screen, but that’s more a wish than a truth. Life does dazzle me, when I let it in—the moments, snippets, breaths, in and out, in and out.