First backyard crocus poked up between snowfalls in mid-March.
Ramblings of a winter-weary writer
Story and photos by Kevin Howell
It begins when that goofy, ground-dwelling rodent pops out of a hole in February to predict the start of spring. That’s the point when I’m ready for the cold stuff to just leave and the warming sun to return in full splendor, but without the torturous heat that comes later.
The gradual change from late winter to early spring is as favorite a time for me as the other side of the year, when the same torturous heat turns into the cooling, colorful days of fall. But this year’s seasonal change to spring is just taking toooo long, which is a curious thing to say when I think of how fast the days, weeks and months seem to fly by as my own long years seem to shrink.
I start looking for those delightful changes about mid-March, about the six-week deadline mark of that damn rodent’s gradual appearance and prediction. I keep a sharp eye out for the slow appearance of the luminescent green of woodland moss along the trail, the first backyard crocus that peeks up from the ground ⸺ it, too, wondering where spring is ⸺ and the first tiny, hopeful buds of trees slowly stretching into a spring day.
A sure sign that spring can’t be THAT far away is when my wife Jean starts pulling out seed packets from their dark storage closet and rummages through them, muttering, “This year I’m going to plant you, and you, and you … Wait, I thought I had some of those left!” When the urge to find the nearest garden-seed seller arises, you just know spring will be here soon.
But it’s still March and this is Michigan. So, of course, it snows again and covers my poor little crocus until the next melt, and it struggles back to the surface — and then it snows yet AGAIN!
Another sure sign of the impending vernal season is the sound of thunder. No, not that silly imitator called “thunder snow,” rather, the real thing that shakes the house and rumbles across the sky, shooting out lightning sparks and dragging torrential downpours of water in the sky behind it, e.g., a real spring thunderstorm, sans tornadoes, please.
As mid-March proceeds into late March and early April, loons ⸺ with their mournful morning tunes ⸺ return to the newly thawed lakes. Red-winged blackbirds, fluttering between yet-bare stalks of tall marshy grasses and cattails, sound off in twittering, tweeting, delightful song across the fields, ensuring an approaching springtime burst of refreshed life.
Of course, an obvious sign of spring is the gradual return to Pure Michigan of that roving species of rolling avians, the snowbirds. But I can’t have it all, and I can’t let that interfere with my anticipation of the returning spring.
Just to test the waters, and encourage spring’s full cooperation in returning another year, Jean and I went beach-rock hunting on a mildly warm and sunny but breezy April Fools’ weekend. Now, we do venture out to the beach for a moment or two in mid-freezing-winter, but those visits are more like wow-isn’t-this-gorgeous-jeez-it’s-cold-out-here short ventures.
The early April trek was an actual stroll on the beach on a lightly breezy and sunny day. Much better! April is moving along now at a quicker pace as it approaches the midpoint, and it’s looking positively like spring is going to arrive.
Hopefully by the time this rambling rhetoric is published, spring will have sprung in all its glory. Enjoy it before it fades to those hot days of the season after.
Kevin Howell is a Mason County freelance writer. He loves the Michigan woods, lakes and, especially, Michigan craft beers ⸺ not necessarily in that order!
More stories by Kevin Howell HERE
