Valerie Schultz: Mountain spring elusive
| Thursday, Apr 02 2009 02:20 PM
Last Updated Thursday, Apr 02 2009 02:20 PM
Crawling back into bed and pulling the covers over one's head is not a normal response to the first few days of spring. Yet, here in the mountains, that is exactly what we feel like doing. Although the calendar says spring, winter won't seem to leave, hanging around like an unwelcome guest long after the sparkle and glamour of the Christmas holidays have packed themselves away. Our version of early spring is more conducive to hibernation than handsprings. Our wildflowers have yet to push their way through the frozen earth. Our spring is still a memory and a distant dream.
Spring in the mountains is a coquette, a flirt, a tease. Spring gives us a little taste of warm sun, sweet air, gentle clouds, longer days, grass beginning to green, maybe even a grape hyacinth or two, seducing us with lush promise. Then she takes it all back. Snow buries the early fragile blooms, the lion shoves the lamb out of the way, and it feels just like winter again. Spring peeks out at us and then withdraws her favor several times before saying yes. The emerging spring makes a fool of you: You feel like planting something, and then winter sneaks back to plant another one on you. Spring for us can be a long time coming; we know that we may yet be wearing scarves on Mother's Day. Every family has at least one story of hiding Easter eggs in the snow.
For me, the traditional beginning of spring is tricky. It is often the time when my immune system finally succumbs to those ever-present germs, both viral and bacterial, that have been wearing away at me all winter long. As a result, my worst illnesses over the years have attacked in early spring, making me feel anything but springy.
I know I am especially tired of this winter, because this is the first year that I have worked for an employer that does not close down its operations when the roads are unsafe for driving. In the past I have worked in education, both for the church and for public school districts. In these jobs, icy streets and slushy skies equal a day at home, with the blessing to play in the snow. An official snow day for the kids and me used to mean hot cocoa, a crackling fire and a jigsaw puzzle, while the snowman in the yard grinned his red-licorice-rope smile through the window. Imagine my discomfort when I realized that the state prison doesn't take snow days, that in miserable weather conditions I am expected to put on my boots, clear my driveway, scrape my windshield, and be at work on time, like a competent professional. Reality bites! The only upside is that, after this winter, there is not much I am afraid to drive in anymore.
I see why old people move to Florida or Arizona after a lifetime of shoveling snow and slogging through drifts and wearing double sets of gloves. The single-digit temperature of mountain air is an unforgiving punisher of old bones and worn-out joints. The thought of spending the winter months wearing flip-flops and picking oranges is almost like an aphrodisiac on a supposedly spring night of cold, howling wind. Even my mountain-loving husband has taken to wearing flannel-lined jeans and ridiculously thick socks well into spring, so it may not be too hard to lure him to consider retiring in a southerly direction. But I really shouldn't complain about the tardiness of our spring, because our mild and breezy summers, lacking the fierce heat that bakes lower areas in July and August, more than make up for the tundra-like winters. Summer in the mountains is something that valley dwellers can only dream of, which is why we hold the Mountain Festival in August. We may freeze through the winter, but a white Christmas is often a storybook payoff. We may shiver halfway through spring, but we benefit from summer's pleasant temperance and fall's lovely foliage. Although we are still waiting for spring to make up her mind and stay, we are mostly lucky to live in our climate. I suppose any environment offers varying conditions that make it sometimes perfect and sometimes insufferable. Except heaven. And maybe San Diego.
