Just when residents of Humptulips County most fervently wish it to end, Winter keeps punching back and refusing to quit the ring. Contrary to our usual wish to cheer on someone whose luck, time or energy is running out but who still endeavors to fight the good fight against long odds, we are not cheering for Winter. We want it to lose, and lose quickly. We want it to give up the ghost and leave us alone – until, of course, later in the year when it will once again suit us anew.
But, it still keeps on punching despite our desires.
By way of example, Helen called me at work early yesterday afternoon to tell me that thick snow was falling at the house and sticking on the tarmac. Since this information was consistent with the previous evening’s weather forecast which indicated as much as 3 inches of snow could fall in our area, I wasn’t surprised or particularly concerned but did decide to go home to avoid the unnecessarily lengthy commute that usually happens out our way in snowfalls of such magnitude. And at a distance of some 15 miles from the office, I did, indeed, come to heavily falling snow which continued for the remainder of my 30 mile commute. Then, some two hours after I arrived home, the snow suddenly quit, the sun came out, and we enjoyed a few hours of sunshine. The snow storm apparently got tired of using the punching bag and simply lay down to rest.
But its fight was not gone and in the pre-dawn hour of my departure from the house this morning it was again snowing heavily. While it appeared to be of the kind of snowfall that would not stick around much later than sunrise, it was persistent nonetheless and I drove through snow flurries for most of my morning commute.
This morning’s snow flakes no longer seemed as beautiful and moving as those first flakes of last December. This is undoubtedly due to my exhaustion with Winter and my impatience for Spring’s arrival, an impatience fueled by a brief Spring-like blast of warmth over the weekend which incited bursts of outdoor activity by many Humptulips County residents seen in their gardens, even though the temperature it achieved would seem wintry in May.
A more important ingredient than warm air also fuels my impatience: the appearance of the year’s first buds and flowers. The crocuses that reside under the trees in our small orchard are up and braving the snow’s curse. The weathered green Winter grass of our field is now sprinkled with a panoply of colors. Helen long ago planted assorted crocus bulbs throughout the grass in the orchard and the plants then spread further on their own. The result is a completely undisciplined, disordered, uncontrolled riot of color shot through Winter’s canvas of sickly green. While I could not actually see the crocuses in this morning’s moonless dark, I could – and I did – imagine them peeking shyly through the thin blanket of remaining snow, sighing at the sight of new snow fall and sharing my sense of impatience by flouting their colors in the face of Winter in that certain mischievous way that only a crocus or a snowdrop can effect.
And across from our kitchen window is a pink rhododendron trying to bud. It has been in a state of constant, incipient tumescence for nearly an entire week. Helen advises that this particular rhododendron tries mightily to flower early every year, but often fails when its buds succumb to a final hard Winter freeze. It may well suffer the same fate this year, but over the weekend its buds flirted formally with us by offering a wholesome suggestion of color to come, yielding a pleasure similar to that engendered by the merest glimpse of a shapely ankle from underneath a long Victorian skirt.
Between the crocuses, the rhododendron and the as-yet-unseen snowdrops that are no doubt up but lurking carefully within their usual nooks and crannies, it is apparent that Spring is rising slowly from Winter’s miasma and that Winter has very little fight left. But Winter fights on, even though the victor is no longer in doubt and even though we humans wish it to depart, proving, once again, that our power over nature is severely limited.
Meanwhile, we who wait impatiently play the “What will we have today” game of weather roulette. The weatherman seems as confused as we are, for at this time of year Winter and Spring can seemingly change places numerous times in the course of a single day. It is most frustrating for those of us awaiting longer, sunny days and more color – those of us weary of Winter’s perennial half-light and muted tones.
If there were sufficient flowers to spare at this moment, I would pull off the petals of a daisy wondering whether “Spring loves me” or “Spring loves me not”. To do so in this seasonal between, however, would be an act of criminal insensitivity, since such nascent color as can be seen serves primarily as a memorial to Winter’s death throes rather than as a herald to Spring.
