Saturday 10 March 2012

Spring Mizzles Midst the Daffodils


Early this morning I went out into the garden to pick daffodils for the Market
It was what the Irish call a soft morning.
I think 'runny' might have been more accurate. Nice, but runny.
And for March, it was warm and blissfully still.


The cats all came to help, as they do. (Also to check I hadn't actually forgotten about breakfast.)

Lots of daffs at the market





Beside the daffodils, the chives are already four or five inches high. New, bright green spears thrusting through the soil, with curly-leafed sage curling up alongside, and hyacinths straggly but damply beautiful and heavily scented in the wet March air. And the pond is heaving with frogspawn on the turn, the miracle of life taking place in each and every gelatinous bobble, while the goldfish circle lazily, like sharks.
Do goldfish eat frogspawn?
I have no idea.

All around me spring has sprung.

The Forsythia's a bit of a miracle too



I love spring, but as husband and I commented on our way to the market, in my head Spring is an Event - possibly even with a fanfare - something I await every year with bated breath, whereas the reality is that it's been creeping in by the backdoor for months, and before you know it, it'll be over. Half the daffodils are finished even now, the crocus long gone, the snowdrops already just a memory.

While I am sleeping, the Shirotae will have burst, and I picked three bluebells in the woods ten days ago.
Bluebells in March?

The seasons are even more upside down than we thought. Looking back, there was a rose in flower on this bush or that climber throughout the winter, and everywhere I look, the weeds are flourishing.
The slugs and snails certainly are.
There is even a fat bud on one of my summer poppies!
But, like me, my lovely viburnum bodantense that has been in bloom since October, seems unaware that spring is here, that it should be packing  up and going to bed. Its bare branches are still covered in oleander-scented pink flowers, the tiny shoots of new leaves just starting to appear.
I think it's waiting for the sound of trumpets.

Perhaps I should tell it - fanfare or no fanfare, this is it. Now. Today.

Somehow I have to get out of my preconceived expectations and learn to revel in the moment.
Every moment.
Even if it is a mizzly one.

Narcissus have such pretty faces

8 comments:

  1. Your daffodils are beautiful!
    They are my favorite spring flower, dependable, robust enough to withstand a bit of weather or small children, they multiply on their own and they are just so ridiculously cheery, how can a person not love them? We are still in the early crocus stage here, with the only forsythia in bloom the branches I forced next to me here on the desk, and while I see the neighbors cow pasture is greening up our yard is still mostly mud, as evidenced by my two year old's pants when she came in from playing!

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  2. Yes, goldfish do eat frog spawn.

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    1. Ah! Thank you. My worst fears confirmed.
      I am harbouring sharks in my pond.

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  3. I am so envious. We will not have daffodils for at least another month, my forsythia never do very well, once the daffys do bloom it will snow on them again because it always does and I will complain, because I always do. As I look out the window now, I see little snowflakes. I am ready for spring, so thank you for sharing yours.

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  4. Here in West lancashire, daffs just out. Have had a flowering cow parsley for over a month (that is one confused plant-but not as confused as the cowslip in dec)Frogs gathering but not seen spawn yet (not looked for a week though so could just have missed it.....goldfish LOVE frogsspawn.

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    1. Oh dear - I guess my fish are settling down to a gigantic helping of caviar...

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    2. ahhhh...the scent of hyacinth...it's spreading a gorgeous perfume thru my house right now..I've only been seduced by the wonderful bouquet of this flower two yrs ago but now am utterly hooked!

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  5. Adore hyacinths too. Currently have a blue and a purple one on my kitchen windowsill - aside from the ones in the garden that is!

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