“A once close but very dear friend who found her way to central Texas told me over a decade ago that on windy days — when the gales press the windows and the sky is fogged with dirt — that someone somewhere near is making an extremely important, life-changing decision. We have that kind of windy day today. I can only pray that whoever is making that decision arrives upon the choice that is right for them. For I already miss the unvarnished sunlight.”
This is a quote from the reworked prologue of my second novel. It was scribbled in pencil on a sheet of yellow legal pad paper that was somewhat difficult to find when I began writing this piece. The quote has been on my mind — tugging at my imagination, reminding me of unripe pears, mosquitos, and a car chase on rural roads — because there have been a lot of these windy days the past two months in the corner of Texas that I reside in. Spring is well underway and many important decisions are being made.
The vernal equinox marks one of two days in the year wherein there is an equal amount of daylight and nighttime. Its fraternal twin, the autumnal equinox, is six months older or younger, depending on how you look at it, on the opposite end of the calendar. The beauty of the perfectly halved days is the result of Earth’s tilted axis, which, on these days, positions the hemispheres neither totally away nor toward the sun. Rather, the…
