Please join me today in wishing two very special people a very happy birthday: my husband Andrew and my sister-in-law Alyssa. You are both spring, embodied, in all its beautiful blooms, sunny days, and eternal optimism. Our little family is so much richer for having you both in it, and I know that my life, in particular, would be so much worse off without you. Happy, happy birthday, you lovely humans.
Today’s accompanying tune: “Bloom” by The Paper Kites
I heard them before I saw them. The unmistakeable sound of scales among the decaying leaves from last fall. The way their long bodies move without feet, without steps. The slowness in the shadows, quickening as the light lengthens and their bodies warm. It is not at all the same sound as scales across sand, across dirt. But, I guess, it isn’t so different, either.
The first garter snake moved fast enough to grab my attention, but it quickly became apparent that it was not alone, not by a fair margin. The movement of their bodies among the cover of the forest floor gave the impression that the floor itself was alive, pulsing and breathing and warming itself among the tens of snakes balled up among the brown and tentative, budding green.
It was yet another point in the column for the undeniable arrival of spring, along with the chorus of frogs loud enough to drown out traffic and the coterie of robins intent on bringing the season forth before the end of February. The buds of the deciduous trees, protected in their shells from the harsh reality of a gentle winter, had already begun to emerge, the effervescent green glowing among the dull branches of a forest in repose. The eager cherry plum trees are dressed in delicate pink buds of the sort folks on the other coast plan trips to witness. The chitter chatter of our branch-hopping residents has returned, as have their acrobatics as they attempt to remember where they’ve stashed their stores. Under a clear, full moon, our recently matured barred owl — so determined by the distinctive change in their voice — welcomed us back, and we them. Tonight, the sun will set after 7 p.m. as we steadily march towards the equinox.
Spring is built on a promise, its blooms and birdsong the result of a winter spent quiet, hunkered down, well-prepared. It is the beginning of another cycle, the start of another year. Though we have determined the calendar to turn over in the darkest, harshest weeks of the year, the renewal feels real in spring. When the sun is reliable enough to coax the buds out of their shells, to convince the garter snakes it is safe to leave their hibernation. When the warmth melts the ground just enough to coat shoes in thick, dense, black mud and invites the amphibians to the annual bacchanal. It does not lead the way winter does, with its quiet darkness and time huddled together, desperate for warmth. Spring is not a time of less, of rationing, of making do with what’s available. It is a time of abundance, of optimism. Of resolutions and new year, new me’s. It is the smile on faces long paled by short days and too much time indoors, the sun radiant across their cheeks. It is the fresh air stumbling over itself to push out that which has staled, that which had been sufficient, had protected us, and was ready to be overturned. It is cacophony after weeks of silence, reunion after weeks of isolation. Relief after struggle, light after darkness.
The intoxicating optimism of spring — the scent of new growth, of sun baking on parched pine needles, of the sticky sweetness of the mud — is often misleading, for spring is a fickle friend. It struggles to make up its mind, unable to commit to more than a few days of consistent temperatures, rituals, or wind patterns. The eager blooms of the cherry plum may contend with frost or torrential rain late in the season, their delicate petals defenseless to the harshest whims of the atmosphere. The Steller’s jays may find their nests inundated, the rabbits may need to turn tail back towards their burrows. Spring does not guarantee its kindness, nor its willingness to remain as it has been. It is not fleeting, though it is sporadic. It asks only that all who abide by its seasonality take respite in the present. In the warm afternoon spent basking in the sun, the warmth thawing that which had frozen over in the months preceding. There is no concern for what lies ahead, only that which is happening now.
Spring is perpetually late, or early, or too much, or not enough. It arrives like a lion, or a lamb. It signals abundance ahead, or the promise of a summer too hot and too dry to be enjoyed. It can be too cold, too wet, too snowy, too erratic. How does one plan for spring?
It’s a trick question — spring requires careful preparation and planning, but often flies in the face of it. Seeds can be purchased, fertilized, and coaxed from the soil only to be met with less-than-ideal conditions. It can feel fruitless to lay the best plans, knowing that the odds of success, of growth, of triumph, are never guaranteed and rarely in favor. But still, the natural world continues on, unable to concern itself with the day before or the day after. What it knows is, right now, the conditions are fertile for growth.
Growth is relentless optimism in practice. It has to be, to continue. It is rooted in the belief that change is worthwhile, that it is beneficial, that it is necessary for survival. Growth despises stagnation, despises complacency. The seedling doesn’t know where it has been planted — forest, riverbed, crack in a paved sidewalk — only that it must reach towards the sky, undeterred, until it reaches fresh air. It must grow. The snakes safely hibernating must trust that venturing out into a world changed by the harshness of winter will still be a world in which they can thrive. To stay stagnant, to stay complacent, in their case, is to struggle to survive.
Though the unknown, the unpredictability, the temperamental nature of spring can be uncomfortable, it is the push we need to grow. To emerge from our comfortable homes into the blinding sunshine to which we are not yet accustomed. To look up from our rooted places and see where we are headed, knowing that we will have to weather that which is not ideal, that which is harmful, that which hopes for our demise. That we will have to grow, to change, to bloom in all our optimism, because that is what spring asks of us. Because it is what life asks of us, again and again. It is only our nature to answer.
Here’s to finding growth this spring.
- Megan