April Fool’s Day 2025

No thirty inches of snow!  No ice storm!  No baseball sized hail stones!  April Fool’s Day didn’t punish us here in New England.  It’s a bloomin’ miracle.  It’s a pretty nice day so Camera Girl handed me her “Honey Do” list.  The one item I’m stalling on is walking the property with a garbage bag and a stick with a nail on it picking up all the trash that has blown into the wooded areas.  As Sergeant Snorkel told Beetle Bailey, “If it don’t walk, if it don’t talk, police it!”  But it’s annoying.  It makes me feel very uncharitably toward the whole human race when I see what kind of stuff they toss out the windows of their cars.

So, I was driving down the main east-west road in Dunwich in a section that is full of blind curves and rolling hills when up ahead about a quarter of a mile I see something in the road.  I see it’s moving but it’s too short to be an adult human so I slow down.  “Could it be a child or is someone sitting or kneeling on the road?  And then I can see.  It’s a huge tom turkey with his feathers and wings all puffed up.  He’s in the oncoming lane and he’s staring me down!  So, I creep past him looking for his harem.  But I couldn’t see them.  Either they were shielded by the trees or they were gone.  But Tom was sticking to his guns and wasn’t afraid of me.  So, I left him there and in my rearview I could see him still standing there like some blithering idiot trying to act as crossing guard to an invisible flock.

After cutting down the raspberry canes last week I’ve been hoping to see some leaves sprouting up from the dirt.  So far nothing.

But the hellebores are coming up.  More confidently in the sunnier areas and tentatively in the shade.

And likewise for the daffodils.  We have three different stages of development depending where they are on the property.

The hostas near the house have just broken ground.

And this little crocus is bravely showing its colors.

So winter is climatically over.  I will now stow the shoe spikes, snow shovels, ice scrapers, snow blower, snow boots and all the rest of the paraphernalia that litters the mud room and move forward into the growing season.  And now that the ground is completely thawed, I can begin things like fixing fences, gates, damaged wood and all the other weather-beaten components of my poor house and adjacencies.

And I will move the lawn mowers to the front of the shed and contemplate that fateful moment when I drive the mower over the grass for the first time this year.  Right now, it’s unimaginable.  Some of the grass is overly long and soaked with winter water in the soggier areas of the west field.  Some areas are worn away by snow, ice and rain.  Other areas are dead and brown.  Cementing the whole thing over sounds like a better solution.  But in just a very few days the darn thing will revive and life will return.

And in honor of this projected return of life I have put out ten preying mantis egg sacs.  I purchased them from an American company that said they are Chinese mantids.  Well, why not?  Apparently, they’re already outcompeting the Carolina mantis right here in New England.  Who am I to stand in the way of Darwinian selection?

The only thing left to cap off the beginning of spring is the reappearance of the pond turtles.  They have not made their reappearance but Camera Girl will keep me apprised of their status.

“O brave new world that has such people in it!”