The annual search has begun. Spring is out there. Sometimes it only peeks around a corner, but more and more often, it springs out with more regularity. (Pardon the pun, if you’re not a pun lover…) Lots of signs out there…
I heard them laughing, the sandhill cranes. More than anything else in the spring, I wait to hear that sound over the nearby marsh. They trill to each other as they wing their way north. Once I’ve heard them, I try and pinpoint where they actually are. Out in the cornfield covered with stubble from last season’s cut? Still overhead somewhere? Over there, maybe, coming in low to settle in the lake out of sight behind the trees? Most of the time, I can’t find them. But day by day, more cranes call and I know it’s only a matter of time before I spot them. Most often I spot them overhead, necks straining, legs stretched out in their own personal jetstream. Herons fold up their necks when they fly, looking like English lords headed for tea with the queen. Regal, a bit egotistical. Cranes, on the other hand, are determined to get where they’re going, wherever that may be. They stretch out in the sky like streamlined airplanes searching for a destination. It’s spring, so maybe they’re desperate to find a mate. Looking for love in the marshes, in the fields. Who knows? But where the herons sail on with little on their minds, the cranes are focused forward, ever forward.
How do the flowers know when to struggle out of the ground? To me, the ground is cold, and there are patches of ice still here and there in the woods. Yet, the tulip leaves, folded around themselves like a tongue rolled, stick up out of that cold ground. Daffodil spears are more like a finger testing the air, lean from fasting all winter. The big hyacinths show flower buds hugging the ground almost as soon as the leaves emerge. But I watch the grape hyacinths most carefully, as their green fronds never disappeared over the cold weather, sticking around to tease. Eventually, I see the cluster of beads that herald the flower heads popping higher. Come to think of it, several of my plants never lose their form and color when the temperatures plunge. The coral bells no longer send up delicate stems, of course, but their fluted leaves stay grouped like heavy green lace through the worst of the storms. A big stand of sedum, which explodes into fat green leaf clusters and cloudy purple flower bunches in the summer, dies back into little nubs of green clinging to the soil, but never give up their color.
The birds are building too. I learned to put out one birdhouse in early March to entice the chickadees to nest. It’s in the garden, and I delight in watching those cute little flyers pop in and out. They have to be quick about raising a brood before the wrens get back, or those feisty wrens–who build a nest in every single birdhouse–will take over and build a nest right on top of the chickadee’s nest, even if there are eggs already. Chickadee eggs look like tiny tan peas, but the wrens don’t care. Don’t get me wrong, I love the wrens and their warbling that sounds like water burbling over stones in a brook. But they are aggressive. Robins take their time in choosing just the right evergreen for nesting. Most often, they are right outside the garage, where I can spy on the ongoing miracle. Sometimes they’ll build in a tree, where the nest is invisible until all the leaves come off in the fall. I have no idea where the woodpeckers nest, but there are plenty of old ash and other trees with holes ready for occupancy.
The squirrels are active, as are the chipmunks, those pesky little cuties who challenge my husband’s sanity with their invisible tunnels. The patio furniture is already out, having weathered the winter out there in all its recycled milk jug glory. I hear the telephone-ringing call of the redwing blackbirds, and the geese continue to sail overhead, their raucous calls bouncing off the clouds. And… You know what? You’ll have to excuse me now, because the sun is warming the patio and I need to get out there. I hope Spring puts spring in your life, as it does mine.