Daffodils decide that February, this February anyway, is a fine time to return.
Certainly this particular February ssems to be. We're expecting 70s this afternoon.
The daffodils always emerge early, by my sense of things, not theirs — they have their rhythm, and they follow it, whatever this year's late February and March bring their way.
The temptation to follow their lead and fill the garden with plenty of plants that are not daffodils is strong — even though I know that we still have close to three months of frost possibility ahead, and , no doubt, at least a few brutal nights. maybe more than a few, and maybe more than a few of them later than March. I have seen, once or twice as a consequence of either irrational exuberance or irrepressible optimism (or both), snow on my tomato plants. I know better, I guess, but some years that doesn't stop me. This may be one of those years.
Like the daffodils, I find myself in the last weeks of February — even when late February less begin than this year — beginning to raise my head in awareness that whatever winter remains, the worst is past, and whatever cold or snow or ice visits, won't linger.
The weather this week is false spring — but that doesn't mean the real spring isn't there, coming our way for real, real soon.
Can't wait — but probably my tomatoes should.
1 COMMENT:
fredFebruary 21, 2011 at 11:27 AM
I call this season NeitherNor, neither spring or winter, a time of false starts, but real hopes. Soon and very soon....