What hope looks like....

This is what I love most about nature....even in the midst of darkness and death...

new life happens. This new little sapling is growing out of the old trunk of this fallen tree....and is in bud against the dead brown leaves of last summer.

As I snapped this picture this past weekend I smiled and thought this must be one of the ways hope would manifest if it stopped to pose for a picture.

Holding onto hope...

Sometimes everything seems so upside down and wrong in the world that it is easy to fall into despair...

But then there is that one surprising moment of beauty that reminds you to hold onto hope....

My heart is heavy for all those suffering today, especially those in Japan....and if we give up hope, we have nothing to give...