Beavers and Ducks!

You may not realize it but . . . spring has sprung. Oh sure, the local weather man is threatening that there is a HUGE COLD AIR MASS heading our way and, in order to save ourselves WE MUST RUN FOR OUR LIVES.

Winter is always a short prison term as you sit inside, looking outside at the cold, dead world outside and you run to make a cup of hot chocolate laced with No-Doz. Everything is sleepy and tired and barren and boring.

There’s nothing to do in the winter that doesn’t involve a form of ice in your underpants or loss of circulation in your hands. No one cares about you either. You explain your misery, but they stare at you with a look that says, “Shut up. My ass cheeks are pink and raw from sliding down the ice. Do I look like I care about you?”

You’re all alone.

Children, however, seem to have some sort of magical chemical protection from certain types of cold. When I say certain types of cold, I mean:

--When playing in the snow.
--When you desperately want to go inside.
--After dark when they are supposed to be inside.
--When they are supposed to be doing their homework.
--When you’re standing out there watching them come back from the bus, and they take a detour through the bushes, to a pile of rocks, weaving in and out of parked cars, to climb a tree, to pick leaves out of their friend’s hair, to look over the pile of goose droppings and analyze what they have eaten, to throw rocks from the said pile at said pile of poo, etc. and on and on and on. Then, when she finally arrives at the door she looks at your icy corpse and says, “Were you calling me?”

But it works in reverse. It can be exactly 48 degrees, which is not cold, and you have things that you must do outside with the child. Such as, loading things in the trunk before going to grandma’s house. This makes her cold. As does:

--Walking ten feet from the car to the grocery store.
--Inside the shoe store.
--Inside the greenhouse at the botanical gardens.
--While sitting on top of the heating register while wearing eight wool sweaters, an elk hide, forty-two pairs of mittens, seven hats and one of those blankets they use for victims of shock.
--When she accidentally lights her clothes on fire while trying to mix two chemicals together to create a potion that causes lead to turn into gold.

Damn kids. They don’t make sense.

But spring has sprung. I have proof.

Outside my window, which was dead and barren yesterday, there are at least fifty Chimney Swifts flying around, arguing, fighting and I think making baby chimney swifts. The birds have returned and they are singing. Loud. And staring at me.

Holy crap they can open the door! They’re coming towards me! Wow they look mean. Quick, get help! Go get hel . . .

Discuss