WHEN LIFE GIVES YOU MUD…

It’s mid-March and puddle season is off to a running start.  Which always reminds me of my years in Catholic grade school.  After one morning of non-stop drizzle, the principal cancelled lunch recess on the playground because too many students “could not tell the difference between dry land and puddles.”  Au contraire, Sister Josetta!  We were actually quite discerning.  Our squeaky, wet shoes did not get that way by accident!

During my college years, I and other “auto-challenged” students carried our umbrellas in our backpacks from February to June.  They not only sheltered us from Ohio’s random spring rain showers, but also shielded us from those evil drivers who would gleefully swerve into deep road puddles, then laugh as the resulting spray power-washed our pant legs.

Nowadays, my canine children seek out every rain-filled pothole in the long gravel lane where we take our midday walk.  For years, I recoiled, keeping my distance from their antics.  Then my sister gave me a pair of Wellies — girlie pink ones sprinkled with polka-dots.  These thick-soled rain boots weigh a ton but strangely, when I slide them on, my feet feel light and happy, like I could skip for a mile, strategically stomping and splashing in every puddle along the way.  When life gives you mud, you can wallow in it or you can dance.  I’m gonna dance.  Welcome, Spring!

ROMP AND CIRCUMSTANCE

Life yawns and stirs as the sun waxes
Birds twitter and chirp from budding branches
Bulbs push up their green leaves
Early crocus cheer on daffodil and tulip

Bracing breezes sail through open windows
Freshening the stagnant breath of hibernation
Furnace in the morning, AC by afternoon
Or simply embrace spring’s chills and fever

The cat plaintively meows for liberation
To canvass our neighborhood and others
Reacquaint herself with the woods and fields
Equinox renders her curfew irrelevant

Morning air is smoky gray and electric
Transporting the promise of rain
Soft, steady, comforting, hypnotic drops
That melt away Jack Frost’s icy sting

The snow vanishes without a trace
Percolating into the thawing ground
Leaving mud, glorious mud
For me and my Wellies to romp in

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