Ah, spring.
How wonderful.
Except … on Monday, Memorial Day, I fetched logs and built a fire in the woodstove to take the edge off the day’s damp chill. The day was so dark that lamps were on at noon.
Sorry to be the wet blanket on your “unofficial beginning of summer,” but lately it feels like I’ve been sleeping on a leaky waterbed.
On Tuesday, I wore my goose down/waterproof shell combination ski parka. Over a sweatshirt. Which covered a long sleeve quarter-zip shirt, itself on top of a T-shirt. In total, if you count my “natural insulation,” I had six layers between my heartbeat and the elements on the penultimate day of May. And still I was cold.
Wednesday was a weather whirlwind: damp and chilly followed by brilliant sunshine and warm temperatures — wardrobe change, please! — which were quickly overcome by black clouds, thunder, lightning, driving rain and steady hail.
Though they may feign commiseration, I suspect the meteorological mavens Mark Breen, Lawrence Hayes and Steve Mileski of VPR fame actually love saying “heavy downpours,” “temperatures well below seasonal norms,” “upper level dynamics are favorable for thunderstorms,” and “a stubborn level of marine air that is preventing much of a warm-up.”
But the seeds of my grumpiness this spring are not rooted solely in the weather. In April, I heard what sounded like pebbles being thrown against our windows. At first, I noticed it as I tried to cajole a child to the breakfast table so we wouldn’t be late for kindergarten. Soon, though, it became more frequent and fervent. A clacking racket, oddly panicky, striking outside different rooms of the house.
After a little sleuthing, I spotted a crazed robin attacking the windows of my home. A call to the Vermont Audubon Society informed me that I had a territorial bird on my hands. He wanted to warn off any rival suitors, and was engaging in a little beak-to-beak combat with his reflection. I would have to wait until he had made his nest and found a mate for the noise to stop.
However natural the behavior was, it was infuriating. He would slam into the glass, and then perch on the sill, jump up, spread his wings and peck his mirror image. The incessant noise made the living room a no-go zone. There was also physical evidence: The winged warrior left hundreds of little marks on our windows, turning one section opaque with white bird saliva, smudged blood and pulverized plumage. In a lovely coup de grâce, the feathered freak defecated all over the windowsills. Turns out that one of nature’s most trusted signs of spring can be a royal pain.
Robin redbreast was not the only member of the bird family to infiltrate my spring. A phoebe has nested above a window over our back deck. Despite admonitions from my mother, an accomplished amateur naturalist, I did not knock it down immediately. Now, it, too, poops on my property, including the deck chairs. Each time I open the screen door, a frantic flurry of feathers flies a few feet away, and the eggs are left unguarded. Is it wrong to watch the bird worry while I cook one of its distant relatives on the grill?
It feels like the Upper Valley is hosting the Annoying Things With Wings Conference. My windows and screens have been attacked by what I at first thought were X-Wing fighters. Closer inspection revealed them to be moths large enough to skeeve out anyone but Jame Gumb (of Silence of the Lambs). Creatures abound in daylight, too. On a lone sunny day in a Biblical stretch of rain, I got myself several dozen black fly bites that swelled to the size of button candy. They itch like wasabi burns.
Four-legged neighbors have delivered their own challenges. On the very morning I planned to take it down, I found my bird feeder on the ground, ripped from a now-bent shepherd’s rod. While the visit was not nearly as dramatic as what my friends in Hanover have endured, it nevertheless gives one pause to know a bear is about.
Last week, I planted an amateur herb garden, which I fear will drown before I enjoy it. On the first morning after planting, my parsley plants had pleased the palate of a woodchuck, who I have since spotted outside my kitchen window.
Had he the guts to go seasonal, the book character Alexander would definitely call this the terrible, horrible, no good, very bad spring.
And yet.
Just when Negative Nancy was about to pin Pollyanna for a 10 count, the character of the Upper Valley community rescued my mind from the darkness. A man at the gas pumps smiled through the drizzle saying, “Helps things grow!” Minutes later, a child echoed the sentiment, commenting, “Rain is good for plants.” My family is excited to see the phoebe chicks when they hatch.
Last Sunday, I gathered with community members at the Norwich Memorial Day Parade. I saw faces from my childhood who reminded me of my own youthful marching in past events. I made small talk with strangers while observing many different families sharing a picnic lunch across three generations. Someone commented that, every year, when she sees the marchers — veterans, Boy Scouts, volunteer firefighters, a community band — coming down Main Street to the memorial in front of Tracy Hall, she just starts crying. I know there is an element of sadness that makes those tears well up, a tacit acknowledgement of prices paid and sacrifices made by strangers and neighbors for all of us collectively.
But I believe there is also a deep reservoir of simple gratitude, a profound recognition of our good fortune to live in this unique place that straddles two small states in the middle of nowhere. With the sun high in the midday sky, as children ran and played and their grownups chatted and laughed, a woman made a comment that erased all the petty annoyances of late. “This event,” she said, “is everything that is right about small-town life.”
I just smiled at her, nodding in silent agreement.
Ah, spring.
Mark Lilienthal lives in Norwich. He can be reached at mlilient@gmail.com.