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Come On! You Can Do It!

Come On! You Can Do It!

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Is it any wonder that shy spring flowers are timid after this winter? Even as late as Sunday they were being pelted with snow, sleet and freezing rain.

Somehow — the angle of the light, the lengthening days — the world is still preparing itself for the new season. There’s that promising pink haze at the top of the tall trees, the way buds look 80 feet away. And there are green shoots and flowers pushing up all over town. Rumor even has it that the cherry blossoms are primping for their big show.

But here on the shady side of morning, the daffodils are looking less than sure of themselves. Yesterday I bent low, snapped a few shots, and gave them a pep talk. “Come on, guys. You can do it!”

They had nothing to say for themselves; only hung their heads a little lower. But I have confidence in them. Sixty-degree temperatures are forecast again for today. It’s only a matter of time …

The Whiting of the Green

The Whiting of the Green

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On Saturday I spotted signs of spring, snowdrops and green shoots, that pinkish haze that appears in the tree tops, proof the old oaks are coming to life.

It struck me as I strolled that I might be imagining the greening branches, the swollen buds, that maybe they were like the puddles of water that appear on a hot summer tarmac.

Because today, St. Patty’s Day, I’m not so sure. It looks like a foot of snow outside. It’s the whiting of the green. And for some reason, I welcome it.

It’s such a quiet, dutiful dousing, wet and heavy, clinging to each twig and bough. It stills me — and fills me with wonder, that such meteorlogical marvels can exist this far into the greening season.

Spring will come soon, no way it cannot. The shoots and buds are biding their time. But for now, on this day devoted to green, we have a different kind of beauty. It’s white.

Free Hour

Free Hour

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A free hour, from 6-7 last evening, and the trail beckoned. The sun was low in the sky and the evening was soft and warm. Cyclists whizzed by me and my legs felt heavy and tired, so I kept to the right and warmed up slowly. 

Ten minutes in and I was flying. Well, not really. But it felt that way. It’s been such a long, cold winter. And to be dressed only in one layer, moving at my own pace down a path in the suburbs, seemed perfection to me then.

Maybe it was runner’s high or maybe it was spring fever — and it certainly had something to do with daylight savings time. But whatever it was, I was not alone.

Everyone I saw — from the ferociously helmeted bikers to the boxy guy padding along in thin sandals — seemed to feel the same way.

Cold May Day

Cold May Day

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As I write, the temperature hovers above freezing. 35 degrees on May 14!

Cold spring days are the smell of cut grass in nippy air. They are the crisp edge of morning when dawn is brisk as well as bright. They are lingering dogwood, preserved by the chill.

The seasons bump up against each other, one ready to begin and the other not ready to leave.

I know how this story ends.

The question is when.

A May Day

A May Day

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I’m two days late on this one, but the story still needs telling. What we have here is perfection.

The azaleas are out and the dogwood still in bloom. The clematis winds its way around the lamppost. Tulips nod valiantly by the door. Forget-me-nots spread a blue cloud in the garden.

The front door is open and light pours in. May is like that. Early in the month it’s pure spring. But it opens the door to summer.

Not May Day. But a May day.

The Aftermath

The Aftermath

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Two days of weather and it’s raining not just drops but petals.

Blossoms fall from the trees, cling to sidewalks, cars — and park benches, too.

A house I passed yesterday in the twilight caught my eye, its front lawn covered with vivid pink petals, from a Kwanzan cherry, I think. If I’d had time I would have stopped and snapped a picture.

Instead I remember this: an ordinary house, a tree branching green, a yard with pink snow.

A Pageant of Green

A Pageant of Green

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On a walk this weekend I notice not just the pinks, purples and blues — but also the greens. Not just one but many, the trees as variegated in spring as they are in fall.

The delicate veil of the new weeping willow. The shiny darkness of the budding holly. The praying-hand buds of the tulip tree. The juvenile leaves of the red oaks, formed but not yet fully.

A ring of green around the meadow. A scarf of green tossed carelessly across the roof.

A pageant of green, freshened by rain.

Grass Moon

Grass Moon

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It’s not green, not blue, either. It’s a brilliant white, brighter than any recent winter moon. It’s the Grass Moon, a springtime orb, arriving just as the grass is starting to grow again and the mowers are humming and before we’ve grown tired of that weekly ritual.

 I learned of the Grass Moon by reading my favorite go-to weather site, the Capital Weather Gang. It will be a beautiful full moon tonight, the “Gang” told me, the Grass Moon. So I tiptoed out the front door at 9:30, trying not to rouse the dog, and stared at the moon peeking through the branches of the dogwood tree.

It was doubly framed, this moon, first by the tall oaks and then by the white blossoms of the tree. The moon shed enough light that I could make out each separate flower, could notice the details of branch and bloom, could have probably (if I’d wanted to) knelt down and counted each blade of grass.

It was a moon that brought the rest of spring into focus.

Wikimedia Commons: Fir0002/Flagstaffotos

Twisted

Twisted

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In this season of flower and shoot, consider the redbud tree. Its bloom is not red at all, but a vivid  shade of lilac. Like jewel-tone azaleas, this plant does not mess around with pale pastel. It is bold.

But it’s not the bud of the redbud I want to talk about, it’s the trunk — often gnarled, like the most venerable of the Yoshino cherries.

When I see a twisted trunk I think of Sherwood Anderson’s Winesburg, Ohio:

On the trees are only a few gnarled apples that the pickers have rejected. … One nibbles at them and they are delicious. Into a little round place at the side
of the apple has been gathered all of its sweetness. One runs from tree to tree over the frosted ground
picking the gnarled, twisted apples and filling his pockets with them. Only the few know the sweetness of
the twisted apples.

In spring our eyes are drawn to extravagant bloom and brilliant color. But underneath are the crooked trunks, which are beautiful all year long. They are sturdy in their imperfections. They are as sweet as twisted apples.

The Other Cherry

The Other Cherry

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To visit the Tidal Basin in late March or early April is to walk through a tunnel of ethereal white blossoms, to be transported into the soul of early spring. The Yoshino cherry trees never fail to transfix and amaze a winter-weary populace.

But there is another blooming cherry tree, a later arrival, whose beauty I appreciate more each year. It’s the Kwanzan, its blossoms pinker and more vivid than the Yoshino. The Kwanzan have a warmer hue and a more generous, sturdy flower. Fat-fisted, big-hearted —as awe inspiring as their cousin, maybe even more so.

I’m looking at ours right now. I didn’t understand what it was when we bought it, thought we’d purchased a Yoshino, and the first year or two was disappointed with its late, scarce bloom. But this year it has come into its own. Right now it’s wagging its head in the cool, brilliant sunshine. Look at me, it’s saying. Have you ever seen such a sight?