The Salt of Renewal
The smell of rain on dry, sun-baked earth is a scent that travels deep into the marrow. It is the smell of a promise kept. When I was a child, I would press my palms against the rough, cooling bark of the olive trees, feeling the grit of the soil beneath my fingernails. There is a particular ache in the way things must wither before they can truly begin again. We are taught to fear the brittle edge, the snap of a dry branch, the way skin tightens when the moisture leaves it. But there is a secret language in the decay. It is a quiet, slow-motion surrender that allows the new life to push through the cracks. My shoulders drop when I think of it—the way the body finally lets go of the tension it has been holding all winter. If we are meant to be shaped by the seasons, why do we fight the shedding of our own old skin? What remains when the brittle parts finally fall away?
Sandra Frimpong has captured this quiet transition in her beautiful image titled Broken and Blessed. It reminds me that there is a grace in the way we are dismantled by time. Does this image make you feel the relief of letting go?
