"...the month of empty pockets"

a solitary Mourning Dove huddles in the cold...
hoping for a bit of January sunlight...
to break through and find her...
as she perches on a telephone line across the street...

I'm not one of those people who need sunshine...
I actually enjoy the dark chill of winter...
the need for a fire to warm you back up...
to chase the damp & cold from your chilled body...

the constant sunshine of my native NorCal can get to me...>
unless there are cold, dark months to balance it...

so I'm enjoying the foggy, damp & cold days we've been having...
our first "winter" in several years...
granted, it hasn't been too rainy yet, or too foggy either...
but the lack of temperature extremes in any recent day...
[not more than 15˚ between the high & low]
has left us all cold to the core...

I love it...

now if the projected, "winter storms" actually materialize this week...
and we get the winds & rain [3 inches] predicted to move in this evening...
our water situation in this area will be greatly aided...
best case, it'll rain heavily overnight, but be sporadic during the daylight...
[people do need to work outside, I know that I have yard work to do...]

I was ambivalent towards January for most of my youth...
it was that dead time after Christmas when it was foggy...
before the daffodils bloomed & the buds began to swell...
a time to recover & prepare for later...

then, from 1978-2002, when I was so busy during December...
January was a foggy blur, to be gotten through with as little pain as possible...

but over the last few years, more & more...
a time that I did NOT look forward to...
actually, even approached with a sense of dread...

it started in 1988, when Dad died on January 2...
I've since lost far too many furry friends during the January/February blahs...
had major home system malfunctions then, [plumbing, electrical, heating...]
and then, lost Mom on January 17, 2007...

last January, I was dealing with the new bathroom construction...
[meaning that I had NO bathroom for about 2 weeks...]
a severely injured finger that disabled me until mid-March...
and having nearly all my furry friends away from home for weeks...

so I've come to see January as the month of naked trees...
filled with crows that wait & watch for their chance to swoop in...
January[& into February] had come to be a period of time...
which makes my current state such a challenge...
since I'm supposed to be joyfully anticipating the provenance of God...

believing that He will change all my months of January...
from, "the month of empty pockets"...
to the time of plenty & good things...
because He is good & He has promised...

so I guess now, instead of thinking of the quote...
"January, the month of empty pockets..."
I need to think of the quote...
"...it is memory that enables a person to gather roses in January..."


editing it a bit to say...

"...it is faith that enables me to gather roses in January..."

'cause God is good, even in January...