March 2020 SOLC–Day 23
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I hopped on the treadmill early this morning, determined to burn off some anxiety and calories early in the day. As I walked, I read on the iPad Kindle app. Well, I sort of read. I’m not sure I could tell you a lot about what was happening in my book. On some level I recognized that it was well-written and interesting. But mostly my brain was craving the mechanical escape of reading without necessarily having to think about what I was reading or to retain it. I guess you could describe my reading effort as mental word calling. Focus hasn’t been my forte lately.

A couple of miles in, I saw a blur of movement outside the window. Easily distracted (Remember?… No focus here!), I turned my head to look outside.

What was that? I wondered, while simultaneously thinking, Whatever you do, don’t fall!

I straightened a bit and tightened my hands on the grips, but continued to scan the scene. Finally, outside the window, near a small patch of snow, I saw a single fat robin hopping about. It cocked its head one way, then the other. It hopped, stopped, hopped. I kept on walking and watching it.

It would be pretty cool if it looked me right in the eye, I thought. I stared at it long and hard.   Like a direct message from spring. A message of hope.  I stared a bit more.

Yeah, well it didn’t happen. In fact, that robin didn’t seem to notice me at all. It just hopped about, periodically pecking at the ground. But still, it was there, and that was something. The first robin I’d seen this year.

As I watched it, more movement caught my eye, and I suddenly realized that there was another robin in the background. And as I looked closer, I saw another. And another. Once I started looking, I saw them all over the yard and bustling about in the woods. Busy little harbingers of spring–and a reminder that regardless of the forecast for the coming days, and even if it won’t look me in the eye right now, spring is coming.