Ode to spring

Not last night but the night before, Shawn and I went for a walk at dusk.  The air was full of evening birdsong and the heavy scents of lilac and lily of the valley.  As daylight faded to gray, we meandered behind the small, busy dog, appreciating a well-watered spring.

We've had so much rain.  The poor farmers are paralyzed.  Even when the rain stops for a day, the fields remain under water.

Recently, while walking in the park, we came upon a sign at the start of a pathway.  Amidst orange warning tape, it said, "Trail flooded!"  We laughed and went on ahead anyway.  Why not?  We could always turn around.

Turn around we did, when the path dead-ended into a veritable lake.  The banks of the Sangamon River had been breached.  A few days later, the water receded, and the ground cover was still alive.  God's creation is marvelous, indeed.

And speaking of marvelous creation, consider the hardy hibiscus.  I always thought hibiscus was a tropical plant, but the nurseries were selling them all over Illinois last summer.  A little google research showed me that there actually exists a strain of hibiscus that is hardy to zone 4!  We planted some on our anniversary last year, and enjoyed giant pink blooms from July through fall.

However, after a bitter cold winter, the leftover woody stems poked up dry and gray.  We waited and watched while most everything else came up.  Nothing.

So, we went to the nursery and bought some Easy Elegance Knock Out Roses to replace the dead hibiscus plants.  Imagine our surprise when we dug up the first rootball and found healthy, turgid roots.  I snapped one and said, "This sure seems alive."  Meanwhile, Shawn was examining the exhumed rootball and pointed to some shoots that were coming up from the sides.

Upon further research, I learned that hardy hibiscus dies to the ground each winter, is slow to start in the spring, grows quickly and suddenly around midsummer, and blooms into the fall.  Should've looked that up a little earlier, maybe.

We went ahead and planted our new roses in front of the garage.  I didn't want to wait until July to have visible specimens in those spots.  But we saved the hibiscus rootballs and transplanted them to the utterly neglected south side of the house, where we will have much additional work to do this season.  You would think we would have done beautiful things with the south side, but you see, it is the hidden side.  I dream of someday planning out a home and building it ourselves in such a way as to gain things rarely thought about these days . . . like morning sun in the kitchen, and no morning sun in the master bedroom, and premium sun exposure for the most visible landscape areas.

Until we get that house, we will be here, and we will see how these new little beauties fare as they welcome folks who come up our driveway.

Another point of joy for me this spring was when we discovered Virginia bluebells growing wild in the commons area of our neighborhood.  I've been wanting Virginia bluebells for a few years now, and can't seem to find any at the nurseries.  This spring, Shawn dug me some up from the wilderness, and brought them home in a big old bucket.

There seem to be a number of schools of thought about transplanting these enchanting flowers.  Some say you need to wait until October to dig up and move the dry corms.  Others say you should gather the seed and plant it in April.  But one source said that he plants them while they are blooming, and they do fine.  He said he does it while they are in bloom because that is when he can tell what they are, since they die back in early summer and are difficult to find thereafter.  So, Shawn dug them up, and we stuck them in the wild shade bed in the back, the one I'm trying to get to naturalize with pretty things.  Since it has been so rainy, they enjoyed plentiful showers and continued to bloom for a few days.  Now they look spent, but I've noticed that the ones cultivated in neighbors' yards are also spent, so I'm just going to let them die back and hold on to hope for next year.  Since Shawn brought them home with gorgeous blossoms, we might get some self-sowing seed out of the deal, too.

The maple tree outside my bedroom window is in leaf now, almost full leaf.  It seems sudden, after the long winter of bare branches, yet there was a spate of time when the branches knobbed up with red blossoms and made my allergies go haywire.  At any rate, I'm thankful for the green.  I love to look at green leaves.

The perfect house would have a view of a tree out every window.  That, incidentally, is how we landscaped our home on Sugar Pine in New York.  I stood in the house, and Shawn took the baby trees around the yard in their rootballs, and from the windows, I directed him to place them where I would like to look out and see a tree.  Our next door neighbors hired a professional landscaper, and the day he came to consult with them, I was in the living room with the windows open, so I heard him say, "We put the trees out at the corners of the yard, to frame the house.  We don't just stick them anywhere like those guys did."  But I smiled to myself, because even then, my birch tree was shielding me from a view of the world beyond, which was exactly the way I wanted it.

Spring is my favorite season.  It took me a long time to realize this, just as it took me a long time to recognize that my favorite flowers are always pink, and that I really do not care for vegetables very much.  Summer and fall are beautiful, but spring is full of so much newness and hope and baby leaves that form like a fragile mist and fill out to maturity even faster than puppies and human babies grow.  You have to capture the moments because they pass so fast, and yet, every spring is a new opportunity to capture the moments.

Glorious lilacs, in their short burst of beauty.

Mysterious bleeding hearts catch a spot of sunshine briefly piercing their shady corner.

Breathe deep.  Summer will be here before you know it.