ONE MORE POST ABOUT SPRING

One more post about Spring 

Because

It's all my fault

The rain, the cold, the winter jackets

All

My

Fault

It reached eighty degrees last week

Not once but

Twice 

So I brought home some of my

Work aloe plants

Thinking maybe they would like to

Decorate the porch

Then the sun disappeared and the

Warmth disappeared and the

Temperature plummeted and

Snow threatened and

Now I have aloe plants all over my

Kitchen counter

Because

It's

All

My

Fault

That Spring refuses to stay

SPRING: THE SEASON THAT DOESN'T LOVE US

Pollen time!

Many places in New England are emerging from Mud Season. Now, we enter the dreaded Pollen Season.

So far, Pollen Season hasn't been too horrendous. We don't have the caterpillars peeing and pooping all over our cars, and we can actually go two or three days (rather than hours) without our vehicles turning into complete green dust-mobiles. I do, however, have my monthly car wash membership, just in case.

The worst part about Pollen Season is the sneezing. Yes, the unexpected, inevitable blasting nasal expectorants that come upon us with zero warning. This, of course, is compounded by things like Mother's Day or Teacher Appreciation Day, when "indoor" pollen arrives in the form of flowers. We do looooove flowers, but our noses don't feel the same way.

Cold season? We have warnings for our sneezes. Our nostrils leak, and we usually say "huuuuhhhh huuuuuuuhhhhhhhhhhhhh" before letting loose a snot-infested string of sneezes. If there's smoke around, like a campfire or a barbecue, we can sense the smoke tickling our sinuses, giving us at least enough time to turn away from humanity.

Pollen? Forget it. All bets are off. (I just sneezed uncontrollably and without warning by sitting here typing this and having my windows open to the outside world of Spring.)

So, apologies in advance. If you're chatting with someone from New England and that person's face freezes for the slightest millisecond, you won't even have time to back up. Before you even have a chance to register their facial tic, at least one explosive sneeze will be charging your way.

Don't panic, though: No germs. No diseases. No plague. But, there will be green . . . pollen, that is. 

We do love Spring; It simply doesn't love us back.

SPRING RAIN STRIKES AGAIN

Here we go again. 

Another Spring with hot, sunny days during the week and cold, dreary, rainy days on the weekend. I had to turn on my heat twice already in the last fifteen hours. I mean, just for a few minutes, but still.

It doesn't help that I'm fighting off a persistent viral infection. Nothing major. It's more of an annoying mosquito than killer bee. But it sure would feel good to sit on the porch and soak up some sun.

Not today.

Sure, I've been to the beach already . . . to stop and take pictures while the Arctic wind beat against my entire winter-clothed body. I'm ready, though. The beach chairs are in the car.

So is my kayak. I love my kayak, but the thing is a royal pain to haul around. It breaks in half, so it's transportable via sedan, but it is hefty and has no handles for carrying. As a vertically-challenged person with small hands that cannot even stretch to reach an octave, I look like an Oompah-Loompah trying to move the thing. Living on the second floor also means I can't just take the kayak out and put it back into my car at my leisure. It has to be a highly-skilled, well-coordinated event.

I'm just antsy. The end of the school year cannot come soon enough (28 more days). Actually, the end of my school career cannot come soon enough. (Less than 400, but who's counting?) 

I can feel the beach.  I can sense the beach. Every hour my lighthouse-themed clock reminds me with a fog-horn sound to think about the beach. My living room has beach artwork. I need the beach sand between my toes.

Until then, I will have to get by with chilly, damp days, and I will try to keep my head down and off administrative radar (I laugh just typing that - I'm always in trouble). Maybe I'll fight traffic one day after school to catch an hour or two on the beach instead of correcting papers since the weather only cooperates when I'm preoccupied.

Come on, summer. Lend these Spring weekends a handful of your better days. Think of it as a Mothers' (Nature) Day gift.

OLD JAIL FOR AN OLD PHOTOGRAPHER

I like to wander around new places when I am away from home. At least, I did until my old car gave me trouble and the engine died. Now I try to venture closer to civilization and cell service, just in case. Still, I find myself in southern Maine on a road that looks like it should be well-traveled, but it simply isn't at the moment. No worries -- I'm still in cell range just in case disaster strikes yet again.

I have a habit of coming across old school buildings. So, this particular morning, I find myself outside of the Town House School. It's an old building, 1900 to be exact, situated on a small tract of land that also houses an old jail and the old Clark Shipbuilding Office. Directly across from the little village of buildings is a cemetery. 

In other words, I am pretty much alone out here.

I have both my phone and my camera with me. Yes, my camera. I recently discovered that Google Photos will not easily nor readily transfer to external sources, so I decide to go old-school (excuse the pun) when photographing old schools. But, as technology is these days, phone pictures upload to the internet with remarkable rapidity. Basically, I'm two-hands deep with two different cameras taking pictures that I probably don't need, anyway, but cannot help myself from taking.

I grab some photos of the buildings, wander over to the cemetery, mosey around for a bit, then head back toward my car, which is parked near the old jail. I wonder if I can see well enough inside through the windows in order to see what exactly is inside the old jail. 

As I get up close, I realize that one glass pane is missing from a higher part of the window. No problem. I hold my cell up and snap a photo, hoping for the best.

Perfection! The picture clearly shows both the old cells and the beamed ceiling. I start scrolling through the group of photos I've taken, both on the phone and on the camera roll, when it suddenly hits me. What if the police should come by, or any witness for that matter, and wonder why there is a broken pane on the window. No one else is around, right? I mean, maybe I busted the glass trying to get an up-close and personal look inside the place. Maybe I'm a vandal!

Notorious for being caught in the wrong places at exactly the wrong times like the proverbial kid with the hand in the cookie jar, I jump in my car to make a get-away. This is precisely when traffic starts. It's as if it is suddenly rush hour out here in the middle of nowhere. I haven't seen a car in at least twenty minutes, and now it's so busy going both directions that I cannot pull out on to the road in either direction. If someone broke that window within hours of my arrival, there are at least two dozen witnesses who can place my out-of-state butt at the scene of the crime. 

I probably should've checked if the building door was unlocked and just put myself into one of those jail cells. A guilty conscience is a terrible thing to have if one is contemplating a life of crime.