April Observations

Grey days and sheets of rain bring the glistening sheen of happy plants, each cell exclaiming loudly with newly-magnified color. Endless shades of spring green weave themselves into a glittering tapestry, interspersed with bright, meticulously-planted forsythia strands of yellow and the occasional outcrop of strikingly azure Siberian squill. Rabbits nibble fresh grass delicately around the squill, for it is toxic to all but the honeybees that deftly load up the navy pollen onto their back leg baskets and tuck this much-needed protein away into their hives. After the rain, everything looks like a Pacific Northwest rainforest, damp and vibrant and full of mystery. Pointed shoots burst forth from underground bulbs, bounding knights with their swords held high to the sky as they ride into the fresh spring air. All manner of worms and slugs trail across slickened sidewalks, making me fear for their safety from rubber rain boots as they blend in near-imperceptibly with the wood chip remnants littering the pavement. A robin splattered in dark mud hops up in front of me. She returns my stares inquisitively, no doubt in need of a rest after adding fresh clay insulation to solidify the twigs of her cozy, cupped nest.

On other days, the sun stretches his warm fingers down to the ground and brings out the town’s populace en masse. Each bright ray gets doubly cherished between such rainy days and after a long, snowy winter. Volleyball nets are slung up on every available pole and overeager beachgoers jump into Lake Michigan, shrieking from the cold but trudging ahead into the low tide in search of summer. Everything feels right in the world during a spring beach day. Water laps up the sand softly and long-unused bottles of sunscreen finally get uncapped. Gulls call to one another just as the volleyball players vocalize, calling each hit. Streams of fat carp with tattered scales push valiantly forward into the lakefill even though inlet waters are too low to cross the manmade boundary into steam-warmed waters on this day. They, too, are in search of summer.

One of our honeybees toting the navy blue springtime pollen of Siberian squill