The locals call it "The Break Up".
No, it's not what you're thinking. No, I haven't had my heart broken by a hunky alaskan man quite yet... it's much much better than that.
It is well into springtime and the snow and ice has just begun to melt. Imagine this - feet and feet of snow that's been on the ground since September and frozen tightly by negative temperatures since December. Just white forever, everything covered in white.
The roads are peeking through and the snow is melting away. What do you think happens when all that snow melts?
Yes, floods and more floods. I drove to Anchorage last weekend and the roads were completely under water and it couldn't drain because the edges of the road were still covered in snow and ice. My dad asked me how town was and I told him, "a slushy, watery, frozen disaster". Just think of the slush that we get in Virginia and multiply it by 100.
Towards the end of winter, I had heard some people say how excited they were for the break up and I embarrassingly had to ask what they meant by that. A coworker explained "it is when all this snow finally melts away but then comes all the water". Alaska is not for wimps, y'all, let me tell you. Whenever you think the snow is all perfect and pretty, Alaska says HOW ABOUT -40F TONIGHT?? When the snow begins to melt and your heart yearns for warmth, Alaska says FLOODS ANYONE?? And then when the water stops drowning everything and you want to finally walk on dry land, Alaska says HERE COME THE MOSQUITOS! Yeah, I basically live in the Hunger Games now.
Okay, to get back on track for a second, what really peeked my interest is what the locals have named this season. The dark and cold begin to dissolve and it's the topic of conversation. Today, I had to fill up my truck, and the gas station was under water! You needed rain boots just to pump gas. I asked a friend, "Gosh, have you seen the gas station recently?" They said "Yeah, it's the break up, it's going to get a lot worse before it gets better".
I think this is so commonly how our lives play out. Things always tend to get even worse before they get better. It's a lesson to be grateful for the change, grateful for the challenges that lie ahead but prove progress.
How beautiful is this? The land here is covered by ice for more than half of the year and it is dark for months. The locals wait in anticipation of when life can grow again, when the ground turns green and the sun shines down on what once used to be very dark. A blanket of white melts away to let the earth grow again.
You don't know what you have until it is gone. The winter season was never like this where I grew up. Life was still pretty easy and it wasn't that dark or cold. There was no "break up" of the earth to reveal the underneath.
Now, I understand why people have an urgency to feel the sunshine. I can feel my body asking for the sun, it wants and needs it to stay healthy.
There is a lot of cold and dark to be found in everyone's life and in every corner of this earth. I have never been in a place where the actual seasons reflect that. A couple weeks ago, I noticed some birds singing. My ears perked up immediately and I took a sharp inhale. Spring! Life! It's here, it's finally here and growing! I've taken it for granted all of these years, but now I am grateful for the change. I am ready for the break up and the challenges that come with it.
I am ready for progress.
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