There are a few signs that Spring has arrived in my yard rather than merely the calendar. We had our first BBQ yesterday dragging the grill through the snow. Two-thirds of the back patio has been cleared off though a persistent layer of ice that is shaded by a short wall of stone is hanging on, melting ever so slowly. My son-in-law and I shared our first outdoor beer of the season as the sun warmed us in our vests. And the first bulbs have started to emerge.
The first bulbs to pop are a patch of paperwhites near the stairs to the basement. The shelter of the furnace stack and the concrete base of the basement doors creates a tiny micro-climate where the snow always melts first and the ground melts. The next bulbs to pop are not as deterministic. Sometimes the snowdrops near the swing set come out but this year’s snow continues to cover any new greens. A small bunch of crocuses have emerged within the pachysandra in defiance to the cold.
This winter has been the roughest on me even though I have been away in warmer climes for over a month during the worst of it. I’m not sure that it is a function of my age or the fact that there are portions of my lawn that have been covered with snow for over three months.
But the light is getting longer every day, though it is not streaming into our dining room the way it used to as the sun is getting higher in the sky. And while another snow is predicted for later in this week I can see that soon the other flowers will start to emerge and I can get back in the garden where I belong.
