Imperceptible signs
By Rudy Arizala
This morning while I was going out for a walk, I saw on the ground scattered silk like white petals of cherry blossoms. When I looked up, our only cherry tree in the garden of our Apartment is starting to bloom . imperceptible sign of Spring. Spring in Santiago is in September. It reminds me that within 24 hours, it would already be the advent of Spring in this adopted country of mine.
Speaking of Spring, allow me to share with you what I wrote many years ago. If you have received it, simply ignore it. If not yet, kindly read it.
One of my favorite songs is "September in the Rain."
It rained last night and the tiny white silk-like petals of the cherry blossoms fell to the ground. How beautful but frail are the cherry blossoms like our nostalgic memories!
Rudy
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IMPERCEPTIBLE SIGNS
By Rudy A. Arizala*
While rummaging over my old files now yellowing with age, I chanced upon old clippings from The New York Times I have been keeping since 36 years ago. Why did I keep it? Then I read among the several topics of the editorial on page 10 E for the day 21 March 1965, one entitled: "Spring and Equinox". Let me reproduce the full text below:
"If spring were merely a matter of the vernal equinox it would be a very dull event indeed. That incident of celestial mechanics occurred yesterday afternoon and, what with fresh snow pelting down, few of us could see that it made any particular difference in the day. No tree suddenly burst into leaf, no bank of flowers opened their petals, no chorus of birdsong hailed the moment or even the hour. The sun rose two minutes earlier this morning and will set one minute later this evening than it did yesterday, but only the minute-measurers will be aware of that. By the almanac, it is now spring; but the almanac never hatched an egg or persuaded a bud to open.
"Spring is beginnings, most of them subtle and many of them secret. Spring is roots quickening, sap livening trunk and branch, seeds being promised to prepare for growth. It is a tempered wind, sometimes, but not always, blowing from a new quarter. It is sunlight falling from a new angle, but an angle that continues to change. It is the thousand and one conditions of growth and renewal, a complexity that reaches the very germ of life.
"The equinox signals one of the conditions of change. We welcome it, but only as a promise that the beginnings of spring are now established and that new leaf and bright blossom and the exuberance of birdsong are inevitable. But what happens, the consequence that adds up to spring itself is rooted in the earth, for it is the commitment of time and change and life indomitable."
There are no spring, winter and autumn in the Philippines. We have only two seasons-the dry (summer) and the wet (monsoon) seasons. Yet, how many of us notice the rainbow after the rain or the first streak of golden sunlight of summer at dawn, the fragrance of wild flowers, the old fire-tree having shed its leaves and now aflamed with a riot of colors; the first patter of rainfall on our roofs , the murmur of a gorgling brook, the dashing of waves on the rocky shore or the heavy moist air presaging a coming rain?
Yes, it seems most often in the coming and going of the season we forget that "new leaf and bright blossom and the exuberance of birdsong are inevitable." The awareness that "the consequence that adds up to spring itself is rooted in the earth, for it is the commitment of time and change and life indomitable." We take for granted the first patter of monsoon rain on our roof; the first streak of golden sunlight filtering through our window panes; the end of summer and the beginning of monsoon and then summer again, the seemingly endless cycle of life around us.
It is our failure to notice or feel such phenomena-- the subtle signs of changing season, time and space which makes us miss the glory and beauty which God has provided us. We alienate ourselves from the rhythm and pulse-beat of nature. We fail to appreciate that a fraction of a second could make us feel eternity if we attune ourselves with nature such as the changing of the season. Perhaps, we are too busy trying to survive we have not had time to notice and reflect on our environment as well as the coming and going of the season. We take things for granted even the air we breathe which is vital to our existence.
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