Today is the first day of spring, and a tremendously beautiful day it was on Cape Cod, too. Bright blue sky, plenty of sunshine, and temperatures in the 60s. I am not usually one to go crazy for the sunshine, being a bit more of a night owl and fog-lover than all that, but even I could see that today was something special.
I slept in way too late, lay about in bed with my cats for a really long time, then finally got up around noon (shameful!), made some coffee, and strolled out into the yard for a walk-about in the garden.
In particular, I was dying to see how many of the crocuses that I planted last fall had survived blizzards, plows, and torrential downpours to emerge safely into the springtime air.
But first, because it is a tradition, I walked around to the south side of the house to see how my grandmother Ella's daffodils were faring:
...quite well, I'm happy to report! They are always the first in the yard to bloom, and it makes me so happy to see them each spring -- a little message in a bottle from a grandmother I never knew.
Satisfied with the status of Ella's daffodils, I walked back around to the front of the house, and down the front yard towards the road and the river, passing by a pile of downed branches from the last several storms that we have yet to cart off to the dump (you can just see Ella's daffodils in the upper right of the picture):
Then onward! to the wee bundles of crocuses peeking up in various patches across the yard:
I sat down for a few minutes to admire them close up, take a few snaps, and enjoy the view of the river across the street, when I noticed that one of my little crocuses had -- alarmingly -- poked its little head up through a dead leaf from last fall, which was keeping it from opening up:
I carefully pried the leaf off, and was deeply gratified to see the flower immediately expand and open its petals to the sun. I could practically hear it sigh with relief and joy:
...which is pretty much exactly how I felt, to be sitting in the sun again, amid flowers, sky, and water, after a long, cold, wet winter.
Happy Spring!