“Spring has sprung, // The grass has riz: // I wonder where the birdies is?”
I don’t know from where or when I gathered that piece of doggerel, but the first day of spring has dropped in Indy. Spring leads, in most cases, to my favorite season, summer, so I am happy we have passed that milestone. As for the birdies: They have been raucously chittering and cheeping from the trees and bushes. And the robins on the lawn have been giving me the stink-eye as they hop past the unfilled bird feeder.
There is a saying that, in Indiana, if you don’t like the weather, wait a minute, hour, or day, and it will change. On Tuesday, March 17th, three days before the first day of spring, the low temperature was 18 degrees, and my neighbor’s newly blossomed yellow flowers had flopped over. By the end of the week, another neighbor greeted me on my walk by saying, “This weather (today) is almost like summer.” I cheered on that thought and continued to step into the warmth. This coming week, March 23rd through the 29th, the temperature range is projected to be a low of 34 degrees to a high of 79, with the weekend barreling in with a low of 29 degrees and a high of 56. Perhaps we are fooling with Mother Nature far too much. As my friend is fond of saying, “This is crazy.”
There is a cartoon series that my youngest granddaughter watches occasionally, called “Weather Hunters.” The children of a weatherman, Al Hunter, seek out the changes in the weather. “Al Hunter” is voiced by a real weatherman, Al Roker; the little “hunters” chase down weather phenomenon and have fun adventures. I’ve not seen an episode where the kids are startled to find that the 70-degree day they enjoyed on Tuesday was followed by frost and a hailstorm on Wednesday. As Indiana would say to a 70-degree day, “Hold my beer…”
Spring “sprunging” has forced me to address the dead things in what passes for flowers in the front of my abode. I should take heed when my neighbor tears out her worn out foliage, but I am not a practiced dirt-dauber. It never occurs to me to prepare for spring by pillaging plants in the fall, but then, I am not one with the growing things of the ground. My friend recently noted that she had been pillaging old plant villages, and I had a brief thought: “Should I be clearing out old growth?” I sat down with another beer (cider,) and listened to the House Sparrows chittering in the trees.
The birds are, of course, in tune with the change in the season, no matter what the weather. They have been my “early warning system” for some weeks now, penetrating my sleep with their calls. Dawn is still yawning and stretching when the birds get busy in the pines: “Henry Henry Henry Henry!” And comes the reply: “Grace what? Grace what? Grace Grace Grace what?” After a while, I groan and rise and flop into my recliner, and think of James Wright’s poem, “A Blessing.” There is a line in it that describes two ponies who have “come gladly out of the willows,” and who “begin munching // the young tufts of spring…”
Suddenly, I realize that I will not be stepping out of my body and will not “break // Into blossom,” but will soon, have to prepare the lawnmower to mow down and rake up those young tufts of spring. Such is Spring: Plant, grow, mow, rake.
And cider.
cjon3acd@att.net