Seasonal Whimsey - Big Chill, Big Thaw
by Kitti Carriker
"O Wind, if Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?" from "Ode to the West Wind" |
It finally happened: the snowfall of the decade! No more wondering if Winter was really ever going to come or if the season was going to come and go without a nice big snow to mark the occasion. 2007 was not to be one of those winters of merely a few flakes; it was the real thing! The schools closed, the university closed, the county closed. We shoveled and sledded as a community. We celebrated and commiserated together. All of those neighbors who had been cocooned throughout December and January were suddenly out on the sidewalks to greet you and say "hello" -- like summer, except snowy!
First there were the beautiful days, then the worrisome days and the exhilarating days, and finally the mushy, messy days, when the snow began to thaw -- right through the roof and onto the ceiling!
I recall a day back in college when one of my professors read "Ode to the West Wind" aloud to the class, concluding with his own cynical answer to the hopeful romanticism of the poem's closing question:
"If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?"
"Yes, Shelley, Yes!" he thundered. "It can be a long way behind!"
Not only did we wait a long time this year, but no sooner were we mesmerized by those first warm days of Spring than -- WHOOSH -- they were gone again. Luckily we had a taste of things to come when March went out like a lamb and the neighborhood was filled with the unmistakable signs of Spring Cleaning! Once again the Clean Sweep seemed to bring out the best in everyone as Purdue students volunteered to work side by side with New Chauncey homeowners, planting, raking, and tidying up a winter's worth of debris.
Don't worry! Those days will soon be back and we can pick up where we left off, with the windows open wide to welcome the warm West Wind!
"For, lo, the winter is past, the rain is over and gone;
The flowers appear on the earth;
the time of the singing of birds is come,
and the voice of the turtle dove is heard in our land."
from the Song of Songs, 2: 11 - 12