For a child, time as the great circus parade of past, present, and future, cause and effect, has scarcely started yet and means little because for a child all time is by and large NOW time and apparently endless. What child, while summer is happening, bothers to think much that summer will end? What child, when snow is on the ground, stops to remember that not long ago the ground was snowless? It is by content rather than its duration that a child knows time, by its quality rather than its quantity — happy and sad times.
A Japanese friend explained to me... "the plum [is] for courage because the plum puts forth blossoms while the snow is still on the ground."