A Shoe Full of Slush

This year, the Spring Equinox is on March 20, a mere 9 days away. I wish I was excited about that, but I'm just not. In fact, I don't really care much for Spring. It is kind of an indistinguishable season here in Florida. The weather is warming up, but after a a mere six weeks of on-and-off chilly weather with a few cold days sprinkled in, its not really something that I look forward to. Plus, Spring means it is almost summer, and although school break is glorious, it comes along 100 degree temperatures, and 100% humidity. I don't do a massive spring cleaning, or really anything special when spring gets here. School is not ending or starting. Nothing really significant is going on in my life. Spring comes and goes without me really giving it much thought at all.

But I remember Spring. Somewhere, in the foggy, recesses of my mind I remember when Spring was all that we thought about. I remember people talking about whether or not The Groundhog saw his shadow, and hoping for an early Spring so that we could bring on the snow melting, and the trees budding. Budding trees, so adorable, coming alive with their little promises of an end to the near black and white colorlessness of winter. I remember actual Spring Cleaning. It was the time when Dad got the screens out from the cellar, and we took the Storm door down from the front entrance. We would hose off the screens and put them in the windows- a sign that warm weather and open windows were near. I also remember slush!

Slush is snow's alter-ego. It is brownish, or almost gray looking, because it is filled with dirt. Dirt that came from sand and salt from the city trucks covering the streets to make the roads safer, stuff snow plows scraped up while clearing the streets, from the cars driving by, and from people walking through it. Slush is gross. It sneaks into shoes, and splashes on pant legs. People romanticize snow. Heck, I romanticize snow. Lovely, puffy flakes, falling from the sky. Coating the world in a pure, clean layer of luminous, icy beauty. But, with Spring comes warmer weather. The icicles, three inches in diameter, start to melt and fall like daggers to the earth and the snowy dream world goes away. No one would romanticize slush, but even slush and threat of impalement from ice daggers cannot destroy Spring.

Spring means promise. It means the end of the freezing cold, and the high heat bills. It means no more shoveling, scraping the windshield, snow blowing, or bundling up. The days begin to get longer, and it stays light past 5pm for the first time in months. That feeling of the burden of winter begins to lift because "Spring is in the air". Life just feels more manageable, and doable, and hopeful. I miss that. That feeling that, though the world looks dirty and slushy, there is beauty blooming beneath the surface. It can be felt. What does it feel like? Well, like "whistling, even when your shoe is full of slush"!

Happy Spring everyone! Maybe we don't feel a giant shift in the weather, or the daylight hours where we live. But let's embrace Spring anyway. Make it a time of new beginning. Be reminded to be refreshed, and to hope in the the unseen beauty in our own lives. Even if we can't see it, and even if our lives seem a little slushy at the moment. Take heart. Let's open up the windows of our souls, and feel the breeze. Spring is the air!

"Spring is when you feel like whistling even with a shoe full of slush".
~ Greg Larson