Spring Inklings

Last week's Nor'easter didn't reach Montreal, but I wasn't here -- we were in rural central New York State, and we got snowed in. For an entire day, no one moved. At the lake where we were staying, no cars passed, no snowplow broke a path. The entire world outside the windows was muffled and white, as if we were wrapped in a feather duvet.

As I dried the breakfast dishes, a dark shape crossed my peripheral vision. I turned and saw a deer walking down the driveway, a path it probably takes often because there are few people around. It stopped under the hemlock trees at the top of the bank and dug under the deep snow to eat some of the evergreen groundcover it obviously knew was there.

The light is higher and brighter, though; the days are longer, and we're clearly on our way toward spring. Back in Montreal I've banished the last dried branches of pine and holly from Christmas, and we've enjoyed an orchid and an amaryllis and a pot of hyacinths brought by a thoughtful dinner guest. My bougainvillea, overwintering in the studio windows, is trying to bloom.

Friends on the west coast, others considerably further south, and in England, are already posting pictures of snowdrops and daffodils, but it's going to be another six weeks here before we see many flowers. No wonder I've been staring at my plants, and fixing them in time and ink.