another year

The gardening season will begin soon. In our Zone 5-6, this beginning will be slow, and limited to cool air plants, the bulbs, shrubs and trees. In their colors, more vivid and gaudy than what we will see later in the longer, warmer period, these short-time bloomers will relieve us of the tedious, monochromatic hues, the dried grass, the wooden barks, the singed greens of certain evergreens that make up our days, that frame our yards, and line the roads we drive.

And we will come out of our caves and start the work of cleaning up leftovers from last year, we'll plot new plantings and think about what should be moved or divided, and what soils need special care with organic amendments. We'll turn soil and prune and stake. That is the work of gardeners.

But the grace note of plants who all winter have been working inside woody stems and deep down in the earth in bulbs will soon be heard, and they will be notes of color, and we would be stone-hearted if we do not watch it, appreciate it, celebrate the 2006 version that comes in this latest year of our lives. Nature in North America has no better moment that this.