Spring is slow in coming to my region this year. Ice is still visible and predominant in the lakes. Snow stands in the shadows in the deep, cool heart of our woods, beneath cedar boughs and fallen trees. Nights are cold, but the mornings are fresh with birdsong and the wind smells like spring. All through the cool afternoons, spring peepers fill the air with a wild chorus that welcomes the season.
My sons have been building woodland shelters, while robins make their tidy nests. I have been pulling the remnants of last year's garden, pausing to listen while a Tom Turkey raucously calls for a mate. The soil is too cold for planting as of yet, but just right for earthworms to revel in.
Daffodils are slow in rising this year, but some precocious yellow pansies at the end of one garden row are blooming brilliantly. Love those cheery little faces. Love their eagerness to bloom despite the weather.
Where ever you are, whatever the weather, I wish you joy and an eagerness to bloom.
photo by Aisling, over-wintered parsnips April 2014