Spring

A thing I need to speak to God about when I get to the place where one can do such things, spring. I love spring, especially in the abstract. Flowers come up. Snow goes away, a great boon where I live. First it smells muddy and new, then green and sweet. It is sunny. Sunny, after the grey of winter, of which we have a lot. The red-wing blackbirds arrive, right after the robins. Boy robins have black heads, their breeding plummage. They stake out territory and squabble, just like human boys. They are cute.
The daffodils are up and blooming, giving a serious lesson in microclimates. The daffys in the village, a mile away, bloom about a week before mine do. For the past few months, seed catalogs have weighed down the postman and my sagging mailbox. I have ordered the tomatoes. And joined a CSA. We plan other veggies, but this summer my heart has turned to flowers. Tulips, zinnias, dahlias, peonies. Things to scent the outside. Things to cut and bring in. I am hoping for wild pumpkins from the ones left out last fall. The snow came so early we never finished cleaning up the garden. My co-gardener looks askance at wild pumpkins, but I plan to move them up back next to the blackberry canes and what is left of the old lilac. I killed half of it and spared the rest.

So spring. Why do I want to talk to God about it?
Sex. Tree sex that is. Thousand of trees spewing pollen all over. The wind fills with it and carries to my nose, eyes and bronchial tubes. It makes my head ache. I cough and sneeze. This year I sneezed so much and so hard I burst a blood vessel in my right eye. People then had to go around saying "ewwww, what happened to your eye?" And I had to say, "No my husband doesn't beat me." Then there is the asthmatic phase, where I don't breathe well and have coughing fits. I lose my voice (not an altogether bad thing). Worse I get whiney and kvetch. In the south I hid in air conditioned buildings. But here? I've been in all winter. Who could stay in now? I can't. I take pills and use inhalers. I go outside. I garden. But I wish the Unmade had come up with some other means of tree reproduction. And I plan to complain when I get wherever.