Oh spring, where has thou wandered?

Local columnist

link Karl Terry

Raw, windy February days are the pits. Thank goodness February is so short — hello March.

This is the time of year when you suddenly realize that winter has overstayed its welcome and you’re ready for a spring day.

All the good sticks of firewood have been burned and you’re chasing up un-split pieces that you know will take more patience than you have left to get them to burn. You gather them up anyway because it’s too cold and miserable to be outside doing anything but carrying firewood.

Cold weekends indoors without football can test your patience. And if you’re going to start that 5,000-piece jigsaw puzzle that’s one thing you’ll need plenty of — patience.

I’m OK with the early spring, late winter snow. I just think it’s a little unfair to have several days in a row when we don’t get above freezing. Combine that with the odd day we’ve had lately in the upper 70s and all this kind of weather is good for is starting colds.

I guess if I owned a half-dozen sections of wheat, late snows, even with the cold, wouldn’t be all that bad. On the other hand, if I were charged with chopping ice for the cows on those six sections, my moods might be experiencing a few swings with the rising and falling temperatures. My preference is for 1-foot spring snows that melt by noon in the sunshine the next day.

Where we lived in Colorado a decade or so ago, folks would be steeling themselves for mud season. I’ll admit it was equally as miserable as around here where we’re getting ready for sandstorm season. Folks in western Colorado took a little different tack on the changing seasons, though.

As soon as the ski slopes closed. locals began packing up to spend mud season in the desert canyons of Utah.

Working at a weekly newspaper, I usually didn’t accumulate quite enough wealth during the winter months to take those mud-season vacations and I sure never made it to Hawaii as some spent the off-season.

Instead, I started spring watching the snow slowly recede and the rivers gradually rise. Even with the extra mud it was at least something to do.

Out here on the flatlands, there are no rising rivers, Utah is even further away and still spring slowly creeps in all through March.

I guess changing seasons serve to sustain our spirits and keep our eager human desires in check. Summer will be here soon enough and I can turn my attention toward the rising mercury in my thermometer.

Ahhh spring, where are you my dear?

Karl Terry writes for Clovis Media Inc. Contact him at:

[email protected]