This week, the light is providing a sense of energy and hope, as it touches the purpling mountains with their millions of buds and as-yet-unformed leaves awaiting the signal to pop out. Sap is running, geese are flying north (I heard them in the night. I thought they only flew during the day!), daffodils are seven inches tall already, and delicately dangling snowdrops linger alongside the last snow hidden in the shadows. I live close enough to the natural world to notice these things. When will the forsythia bloom? Soon.

Would it have been easier if the onslaught of executive orders had arrived now, rather than at the darkest, coldest time of the year? Until 1933, inauguration day was held on March 4th, a much more appropriate time to mark new beginnings. But in the interest of a faster transition, less “lame duck” and more speedy action, it was moved. This year it felt particularly cruel to ask us to move that fast, to process what was happening at a time when we were still needing hibernation.

I walked to the Saugerties Lighthouse a few days ago, early in the morning. A bald eagle defied gravity for a long, slow glide down to a tall, bare tree. The air was electric with birdsong. This was no Silent Spring. Why was I able to hear this gorgeous cacophony? Federal regulation of polluting technologies and investment in clean tech; federal protection of the environment; and federal funding for research that helps us try to understand the complexities and interdependencies of the ecologies we depend on, and the natural sites that restore us. Right now, decades of environmental policy is being rolled back, in a matter of weeks.

 So, as we enter this season of renewal, as we perform rituals to shed the old, I wish for us all to step boldly into alertness, action, joy, and connection. Join GWI over the coming months as we continue to provide forums for discussion and learning, workshops to strengthen skills necessary for a new way of working together, and a continuous commitment to celebrating the beauty of this world we love while protecting it, and each other, from harm.