Happy New Year!

It's the end of another year. Soon, I'll clean up and store Christmas in the garage. Jeff and I will tip a glass of bubbly to our good fortune, health, and the promise of 2024, then return to life as we know it.

Despite the chaos and discontent in the world, we try to keep our eyes focused on positive things around us. It's the only way to keep our frustration in check: deal only with what we can influence. An unexpected gift of brightly colored tulips added a little gardening magic to brighten the gloomy prospect of January.

If all goes well, perhaps next spring the tulips will thrive in a new flowerpot on the patio. Frankly, I don't care if they take a year or two to bloom again, as long as they don't die. Recovery from the stress they've endured takes time.

They have been forced to bloom out of season to produce colorful blossoms for a winter holiday. Even though tulips are perennials, this process is so stressful, they quickly succomb after reaching their peak. Each year I try to defy that death, but once out of the greenhouse, Nature is in control. They have served their purpose.

Such is life with humans. There's always someone out there urging us to do what just doesn't fit with our natures. We push to meet deadlines and expectations. When the goals are met at school, work, or holiday gatherings, a lot of us get sick. New Year's provides a reset button. It is a sacred time, but all we really want to do is collapse in bed and pull the covers over our heads.

My tulips will soon drop their petals upon the table. I'll trim the leaves and store the plant in a cool, dark place to rest before placing it in fresh soil. There, it will be free to grow of its own will. Humans, however, are not plants. It's hard to enter the cold and dark when you're not really ready to face the cold and dark. We need the sunshine or we'll get SAD, seasonal affect depression.

In the Great Basin, January is when big snowstorms pour over the Sierra Nevada. The landscape colors mute to slate blue, tawny brown, and grey. Winter sun breaks the heart with its pale light. When clouds sink deep into the valleys, pogonip, which can freeze the lungs, frosts the world in a crystalline rime. Some folks turn to outdoor recreation or creative activities indoors to fight the gloom. The desert has always drawn artists and writers as a source of solitude and inspiration. During a six-week span of pogonip in Nevada one year, writer Carolyn Dufurrena wrote a book of poetry about it.

I often pull out a favorite scrapbook of our trips down Highway 395 along the eastern side of the Sierra Nevada. Because the tiny towns along this route close for the season, a Sunday drive to grab dinner will lead to disappointment. So, that ragged scrapbook of mine helps me savor the warmer days. My eyes can behold photos of golden sage and cobalt blue skies instead of the dreary pall outside my windows.

Bright colors and lights are important for curing SAD. "Winter lights" some people keep up beyond Christmas are one way to fight the winter blues. We've kept ours up until St. Patrick's Day. Making things with colorful fabrics, yarns, or paints relieve symptoms of SAD. In Nevada, hanging around casinos, where the clanging din, bright images on slot machines, and the presence of other people can chase away the loneliness for a few hours.

My tulips become a harbinger of Spring. They're a testament to the way living things prevail during the hard times only to revive and thrive during lush times. Perhaps it will take a year or two to bloom again. Or, sadly, it will have spent its energy and die. I can always hope they will prevail.

Such is Nature and the Universe. We can exert only so much control over it. There are powers beyond ours that will defy our efforts. For better or worse, the outcome of anything we attempt is not assured; however, if we don't make the effort, we don't get results either way.

So, relax. Tip a glass of bubbly to the tulips and to a brighter time to come. That is a promise we can truly look forward to because the seed catalogs are already landing in the mailboxes.

Happy New Year everyone.

Here's a link to a dear friend's article on his blogsite, The Nighty News. Joe Bauman, whom I met while working at the Deseret News, is an astrophotographer and president of the Utah Astronomy Club.