In Bloom

I’ve been watching the trees bloom outside my window. The wide windows catch the light at all hours of the day, from the soft morning streams to the intense glows of the mid-afternoon. My tree, the one whose branches brush my window panes in greeting with the barest of breezes, is the last to bring forth its buds. It is the largest, I think, awaiting its moment while its younger neighbours spring forth into blossom and leaf alike. 

Every day, I glance at the tiny buds and await the day they will burst forth. My local squirrel continues his rounds, unconcerned by the impending changes. He marks out his racetrack from branch to rooftop, whatever scavenged pastry he has found that day tucked between his jaws. The brief cold snap in the middle of last month sent him into a blind panic. He spent a day collecting food bits on the top of the roof, the scratching of his work a funny sort of companion above my head as I dozed on the sofa.

Toronto is blooming – and I think I am, too.

Last spring, still very much in the early days of the pandemic, I noted how I was starting to notice and appreciate small details I hadn’t seen before – the bird song and the way the light hit the apartment at different times of day, for instance. But, for all my memory of that time, spring just seemed to appear. Winter one day, spring the next, the trees seemingly bursting forth all in one day.

This wasn’t what happened, of course, but perhaps, that course of time in all of its lethargic sameness prevents by mind from remembering the rolling change. Perhaps, in a year’s time, I won’t remember the way the trees bloom now. 

Whatever the reason, this year I’ve found myself mesmerised in watching it happen. I have reported on the status of the leaves to my parents in every recent phone call, whether they are interested or not. 

And with the trees and the flowers and the life appearing, so, too has my own life started to feel as though it is beginning to come to bloom again. It seems funny to think that such a thing could be possible, not least now as my city reaches its sixth consecutive month in lockdown. Not least, when I watch in baffled amazement as my friends back home return to life in a way that feels impossible here. 

Yet, life is beginning up again, even if that remains within the parameters of the reality still surrounding us. Opportunities have begun springing up, unexpected offers arising where I had least expected them. Such offers that make the past year of hard work, often with no one other than myself to keep me accountable, all the more worth it. I tied off the page on my latest novel with a feeling of hope and excitement to pitch it, rather than the aching dread of having to go through the process once more.

So, too, has opportunity taken me out of doors and amidst other people once again – certainly still something of a novelty, for many parts of the world. I pass hundreds, if not thousands, of people a day as I work at a vaccine clinic. Everyday, I am surrounded by optimism. I am surrounded by masked but smiling faces and kind words and pure joy at the first true, tangible sense of promise that many have felt in over a year.

“I’m more emotional than I expected to be,” someone commented to me in the moments after they received their vaccine as I checked off their dose in our system.

I can understand all of them. I felt that, too, the day I got my first vaccine. To be surrounded by that feeling again and again as I have been these past weeks is almost daunting – in the most wonderful of ways.

Long vaccine days made sweeter by beautiful sunsets.

I have to remind myself not to get caught up in it – in the hope, in the opportunity. I can enjoy it still, yes. But spring’s coming is slow and steady and it is not yet summer. So, too, will these experiences continue to grow and change. So, too, will the warmer months bring other promise. The promise of seeing my family again. The promise of further time to write. The promise of a glass of wine on a patio with my friends.

It’s dark outside now. Even the squirrel is quiet, for a while. My tree has not yet bloomed. But it will. Soon.