I’m back from a road trip to Morgantown, West Virginia with my daughter and her fiance. The trek across the midsection of our great country in one of the two most dismal months of the year (November being the other) confirmed my belief that March is a tease at best and at worst, a flirt.
On the trip east, the ditches strained under the weight of tired and dirty snowdrifts. They gradually gave way to their southern cousins, grass-matted and dotted with ragged, soggy litter. A little green peeked out, and suddenly the month looked less tired, more alluring. For a few hours we perked up, thinking we’d left winter behind. But our good humor plummeted as we climbed into the Appalachians, and snow filled the ditches again.
During our week in Morgantown, spring decided to strut her stuff. For a few days, the sun was hot on our backs, and we turned on the air conditioner in the car. Spring flirted so shamelessly that the snow piles shrank too quickly, and the rivers started rising. We left town the same day the rain hit, before the flooding began.
On the way home, that little minx of a March again hid under a blanket of brown ditches, gray skies, swollen creeks, and puddled fields. Once in awhile she flashed a little green on southern hillsides, red in the dogwood hedges and yellow in the willow groves, titillating and arousing within us a desire for pussy willows and warm earth, daffodils and green grass. But never did she stay and satisfy our hunger.
Her playing around put me in a bad mood, and all I can say is, “March, you little flirt, you’re ruining your reputation. Either straighten up and deliver what you promised in the next two weeks, or I’m leaving you for April.”
You just watch. It works every time.
