What is an end, but a beginning?
Before I dive into this issue’s musings, I want to thank you, sincerely and from the bottom of my heart, for subscribing. I know your time is limited, and you’re choosing to spend a slice of it here, with me. It’s a gift, and one I take seriously. Although not every newsletter’s contents will resonate with every reader, I hope something in each, even a small piece, will. And if it doesn’t this time, I hope you’ll let me know, and then I hope you’ll come back and give me another chance, anyway.
Gardens are the epitome of optimism. Although this is technically my May newsletter, I’m writing to you now from late April. The time of the year when I have the urge to plant. To spend way too much money at our local nursery. To sow what I hope will become many many tomatoes (and peppers and berries, oh my!). The promise of growth is exhilarating, and the joy of using my hands to dig and plant and nurture brings a unique sense of pride and satisfaction. I am now, as I write, able to keep an eye on my little garden with its baby plants that will soon bear food my children will pick and eat in the yard. April is joyful and uplifting.
And May is chaos. Or maybe that’s just at my house.
May is a weird month, though, am I right? The bridge month. The unofficial end of spring and beginning of summer. The end of the school year (which still gives a hum to the air, even if you’re not in school yourself anymore) and the beginning of the luxurious stretch where time is like fresh caramel, pliable and warm and sweet. The flurry of to do lists before we all take a collective breath. I could go on, but I think you get the point.
For my family, May is also a month of birthdays.
I pretty much live in an ambient state of low level grief at how beautiful and heartbreaking it is to watch my children grow up. I’m eternally grateful that I’m on the front lines, one of the few who is privy to the ways they’re constantly evolving, giving us hints as to who they’re going to become, marveling at the things they throw at us and the ways they spread their wings. But it’s impossible not to think about the ways that they’re different: bigger, more grown up, with more and more of their lives happening independent of us. The joy of their maturation is always paired with the grief that every day I lose more of their littleness. So for me, the month of May is bittersweet.
And this year I ache a little more. Because Little is now the age that Big was when Little was born. We’re out of the baby and toddler years forever. No more babies. No more hopeful starts. No more anticipation of expansion, of shifting of our family to welcome one more member. (Unless my girls win their campaign to get a dog. But I digress.)
And there’s grief in that, but also comfort and opportunity. Because the older they get and the less they need, the more their grownups can take a breath and reclaim some time and energy. And with that, the more we have the space to (re)introduce the girls to things we loved even before they came into our world—like gardening.
But—much as the rational side of my brain argues for the good things that come from them growing up—the emotional side of my brain still resists leaning in. Because birthdays are a clear and unambiguous demarcation of the passing of time. A reminder that we only get older, and that time keeps moving whether we want it to or not. And May is also the birthday of someone else special to our family, and the first one for which she won’t be here. My husband’s Nana would have been ninety-one on her birthday this year, a birthday which is particularly special because it falls in between those of my girls’.
May is a month of beginnings—a time of renewal and birth (for me, literally). It’s the month my babies came into the world.
And this year it will also be a reminder that time will slowly, but inevitably, take from us those whom we love.
Birth and death. Beginning and end. Sunrise and sunset. Which, if you think about it, are really just the same colors in backward order, starting and ending our day. And if you look at a picture, you probably can’t tell which one it is. The sunrise or the sunset. The beginning or the end. Because they often look a lot alike. That’s scary for some people, but the symmetry is beautiful, too.
Every milestone is an end, and it’s also a beginning. It depends entirely on the perspective with which you look at it. And there’s grief in the ends—grief that can and should be acknowledged and named and felt. But there’s peace, too. And hope. And the hope, when we lean into it, is where we can find the kernels of joy that really make life worth living.
So this month I’m celebrating the births of my beautiful girls, and the incalculable happiness they bring me; and of their great-Nana, without whom they wouldn’t exist. And I’m celebrating my garden as it flourishes, getting ready to bear fruit.
But I’m also challenging you to ask yourself: what beginnings and endings are you facing? What are you planting in the garden that is you, and how are you helping yourself bloom?
Giveaway
And the winners of the $25 gift cards to an independent book store are…
Amanda Chow, who is lucky enough to have been the 24th subscriber, which is the one my random number generator told me won; AND
Andrew Fleischauer, who is the BONUS winner: the first person to subscribe whom I don’t know personally.
Congrats!! And look for other giveaways, some planned, some a surprise, in future newsletters!
Recommendations Roundup
For most editions of the newsletter I’ll give you a short list of books I’ve recommended since I last distributed. For this inaugural one, I’m giving you my favorite books from the last year (ish). Click on the cover of any for whom you’d like to read my short review.
Parting Shot
I wish you the peace that comes from living the life you want for yourself, the hope that comes from seeing your own potential, and the joy that comes from stepping back and feeling gratitude for it all. Go forth, my friends. I wish you well.
—Love, Sarah
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