March

I know we're more than halfway through April, but I'm going to talk about March.

You got to feel sorry for March, everybody hates it. March brings occasional warm spells and things soften up and melt. On the island, that means mud. Squishy, splashy, jump-up-and-cling-to-your-clothes mud. And it's red, and it stains and you can't wash it out. But like the blood it so resembles, mud means life, but we'll just ignore that because it's so messy. Everyone complains about the mud, it looks ugly, what a mess, tracks everywhere and so on and so forth. On top of the red mud, there are the snowbanks hulking by the roadsides, leftovers from storms past. The snowbanks have lost their pristine white and have taken on the grey pallor of death. On muddy country roads they begin to form black edges that spider-crawl over the bank's skin, making deep inroads into that once impenetrable crust. As the grey and black snowbanks melt, the red mud leaks out beneath them.

Then March, probably fed up with all the human whining, freezes up and coats everything with a nice layer of new, so-glittering-it-hurts-your-eyes snow. Everyone complains about the snow. It's cold again, it's icy again, and so forth and so on. Poor March, it's either warm and ugly or cold and pretty and nobody appreciates either.

But the days are longer, the suns' smiles are a little bit brighter, the wind's lost its teeth and doesn't bite anymore (I'm not saying it's not nippy, it's just not painful). Things that I thought would never thaw out again, actually do; the river, the ground, my sense of humour...

So welcome, March, uncover the yellow, dead grass and the good, black squares of my garden so April can revive and green them up. You may not be loved but you're needed.