Frog Song

I love Colorado. The winters are beautiful. I mean absolutely gorgeous! But they can also be brutal. They can make you question a lot of your life choices, especially the one where you decided, Yeah, let’s live somewhere that gets so cold my nose hairs freeze. That really happens. Its super uncomfortable.

Winter begins in earnest right after Christmas, sinking its icy claws in and refusing to let go. In January and February snow can pile up relentlessly, and the temperatures plummet into the negatives, sometimes laughably so. (Last year, we hit -24°F. Negative. Twenty-four. That’s not a temperature; that’s a punishment.)

Shoveling snow off the decks, paths, and driveway is a dreaded, soul-sucking chore—one we do with the enthusiasm of a toddler being told to eat steamed broccoli. And while we know that all this snow is a blessing, that it’s God providing the much-needed water we’ll be desperate for in the summer… I'm ashamed to say our attitudes about it still kind of suck.

So we hunker down, surviving the dark, frigid months, counting down the days until warmth and sunshine return. We go through the motions of our farm chores, made a hundred times harder with the freezing temps.  And as we huddle around the fireplace, we dream of the day we can ditch the layers—of stepping outside without being wrapped in long underwear, a sweatshirt, a massive coat, a beanie, and gloves that make us about as functional as a T-Rex. And we wait.

And then, one day it happens.

The first real sign that spring is near.

Not a groundhog. Not a shift in the air.

The frogs.

Today, as I trudged outside, I noticed it was just a wee bit warmer and I heard it—the unmistakable, magical sound of frogs waking up from their winter slumber. Their croaky little symphony echoed faintly from the pond, a tiny chorus of hope, singing, Hold on, you’re almost there.

It. Was. Glorious!

And just like that, my frozen, winter-weary heart thawed just a little.

Spring is coming. The frogs said so.