August 4: Daffodils are a harbinger of Spring. For that reason, they are one of my favourite flowers. When a neighbour cleared dozens of bulbs from his garden I happily absconded with them and planted bunches around my garden. Every Spring I was greeted with waving yellow faces smiling at the warmer weather and sunnier days.
Spring emerges from Winter with blossoms, new greenery, and returning birds. Everything fresh and new, it’s a colourful season full of the promise of good things yet to come. It’s a time to be enjoyed and celebrated after the colder dark period that is our Winter.
Summer emerges slowly; incremental change brings the trees and gardens into full bloom. Days grow long and fat and comfortable as sunlight extends into the evening. This is a time to be savoured and every year I promise myself that I will wring every moment from this wonderful season. Yet June 21 arrives as the longest day of the year and I begin to feel like the best days are behind us. Summer always sneaks up on me, perhaps because there’s no “landmark” harbinger to alert me to it’s arrival.
I was reminded that we are indeed in the midst of another Summer by the call of the Cicadas. Not one of nature’s more attractive insects, Cicadas lie dormant in the soil for up to 17 years. They feed on tree sap from the root system before emerging and climbing into the tree in search of a mate. It is their raspy, metallic mating call that is the sound track to so many events during the hot and sticky days of mid-Summer.
The Cicadas remind me that Summer is fleeting and now in the dog-days of August, I am in a frenzy of trying to make up for lost time. There are cottages to visit, motorcycle trips to be planned, and patios to be visited. Just in case I needed a reminder that time is passing, several leaves on the Maple in the courtyard have already begun to change colour – a harbinger if ever there was one….