I love spring. Early spring, when we get the first signs that winter will not, in fact, last forever, has always been a great time for me. In elementary school, there was always one day in March in which I could not take any more winter clothes and would insist on wearing a skirt, much to my mother’s frustration. She would inevitably get a call from the school reminding her to dress me in seasonally appropriate clothing, and that would be the end of skirts until mid-April unless we would get an unseasonably warm day.
Early spring is also associated with new possibilities and new beginnings. Every time I’ve gone to graduate school, the acceptances roll in around late February, early March, and spring is spent planning the next steps. I’m currently planning my next steps now, but more on that as plans materialize.
As early spring moves into mid spring, we have periods of grey rain in which the grass is a hyper-saturated green, before it fades to dull Ohio beige as late spring turns to summer. I love everything about this time, grey though it is. I love the storms, the constant smell of mud and rain, and the early flowers. Being in social distancing, I am actually able to spend more time outside than I would normally, with deliberate time devoted to walks. But on the other side of this, I am going to miss out on seeing my parents’ lilacs.
My parents have three lilac bushes. Though they grow incredibly close together to the point of appearing to be a single, large bush, they have never, in the 30 years my parents have lived in this house, bloomed at the same time, giving them about three weeks of lilac blossoms. This year, I had grand plans for drying them and making Lilac Earl Grey (Dear readers, you are welcome to use this idea, but as it is the only truly original thing I have done that the internet tells me no one has done before, please do not take credit for it). Those plans may still happen, as I will likely walk my mother through how to dry and save them, but I am going to miss being home during lilac season. My mother always puts them in vases throughout the house, and that and the soft breezes through the finally open windows are what spring has come to mean to me.
I write this not to wallow in what I’m losing out on, but because I find that the more I share this image, the more real it becomes and I can still get joy from the experience. Enjoy this mental picture of lilacs and thank you for joining me.
Unsolicited Academic Book Recommendation: One of the faculty members from the English Department where I did my undergrad wrote a book that is now available for free online.
(Note: I’m going to try to keep the unsolicited recommendations to things that are available for free).