Growing up in Germany, I came to hate winter. If it wasn’t raining it was sleeting. If not sleeting, it was snowing. Still, we did have four seasons in Germany. They were Sleet, Rain, Snow and Hail. Regardless of precipitation, it was always cold. It should be no mystery to anyone why I live in the Southwest.
My favorite day of the year is the vernal equinox; it means summer is coming! In the temperate Southwest, a first sign of spring is the return of the swallows. Unlike the swallows of Capistrano who returned March 19th, my barn swallows aren’t back yet. Have yours come back yet? Our annual squatters raise three broods a year.
Have they brought the bird flu? I don’t even know if they’re swallows in Alabama.
I’ve been gardening since February the cool weather stuff and I have a big tray of seedlings ready. I did everything by the moon phases this year and everything is doing great.
I also lived in Germany when I was growing up, but I don’t remember noticing the weather much. It was probably too much like what I was used to: Oregon. I remember having a t-shirt that said “Oregonians recently spotted a UFO. The sun.”
Here in the mountains of the Great Northwest we enjoy the textbook four seasons, according to the calendar. Spring is not my favorite; it’s kinda gooey. Nevertheless, I am enjoying the return of the birds. (Unfortunately, I have no idea what kind they are.)
My swallows returned for the 2007 brooding season yesterday. I heard them flitting about through the kitchen window. I figured it’d be soon because the irrigation ditches opened last week. Let the mud nest building begin! Not that they have to rebuild theirs. We don’t knock them down like other people do. Seems cruel to me.