April is here and so is the rain- and the sun, and the cold, and the sleet, and the 75 degree days.  April weather is a lot like living with my teenager– you never know what you’re going to get from minute to minute.  Whenever I wake up to a cold and sleety April day, I groan, long for sun and bemoan my fate, and then remind myself that consistently warm spring weather (and my oldest child’s 18th birthday) are just around the corner.  In March, May often seems like a dream- too far off to make much of an impact.  But in April, little signs begin to emerge that the semester is in fact, winding down and graduation is approaching.  Like little purple crocuses, each meeting in April that is the “last one for the year because we don’t meet in May” is a cheerful little sign that summer is coming!

Here at LEARN, the semester is slowly winding down and tiny “purple crocuses” are popping up all over the calendar.  There are only four LEARN affiliated Spring Workshops left to promote, book clubs are wrapping up, and the last Chairs Council, FYP meeting, and DA council for the year will be held in April.  As you look ahead to your own April calendar I hope it is also covered in little “purple crocus’ ‘ equivalents, bringing you joy just when you need them.  To look at a crocus, be it actual or metaphorical, is to smile, to say yes to life, and to feel joy and anticipation in the goodness and certainty of summer!

“Many, perhaps from so simple a flower, 

This little lesson may borrow:

Patient today, through our gloomiest hour, 

We come out the brighter tomorrow.”

 -H.F. Gould