Remembering the Unmistakable Signs of Spring
“The bluff is on fire!”
That was the scariest thing I had ever heard when I was just old enough to know that fire could be bad. Looking out the front window at the night sky I could see flames high up near the top of He Mni Can-Barn Bluff. I imagined the fire reaching our homes and burning us all up.
Then my dad explained, probably for the fiftieth time, that it was either a controlled fire to burn off the old grass to allow for new growth or it was kids. Since it was evening, he leaned toward kids. And it would never reach us, he promised.
But I never completely got over it. I still exclaim “The bluff is on fire!” I did it recently as I was heading downtown, coming down around the bend from the peak of West Avenue. The view was stunning.
Bluff fires in the spring were unannounced. At least we kids didn’t know about them ahead of time. There might be a fire in the fall, maybe by pranksters on Corn Night. But spring fires were best because it meant winter was over. And the smell of that smoke was a welcome alternative to a long winter of car exhaust and chimneys billowing clouds of fuel oil smoke.
The Welcome Smell of Dirt
The smoke was just one of the many smells of spring that assured us there was hope that winter was losing its grip. For me, the true signal that spring was near was when we could smell dirt. Mother Earth was waking up. When we could smell dirt, we knew the thaw had reached the soil and soon we would encounter a potpourri of spring fragrances.
A common hazard when running through neighborhood yards just after the snow was gone was stepping on freshly thawed dog droppings. We usually didn’t even notice it. But Mom did. The drawback to boots was having to clean whatever ended up in the deep tread of the soles.
My folks loved drives on country roads. When the spring smells started, they would take us on rides. Dad grew up on a farm so he wanted to see how the planting was going. Since he was a biology teacher, he loved going for backroad drives any time of the year just to see what the earth was up to.
On those spring rides, with heads out the window, we sniffed for anything interesting. We could have been dogs. The air seemed fresher with the city smells filtered out. Even weeds in the ditches had a fragrance. Our eyes were peeled for any kind of blossom but we often got a nose full of the unmistakable scent of freshly spread manure.
Timing is everything, of course. Spring scents don’t last long. Apple blossoms are short-lived as are lilacs and lilies of the valley. We had a whole row of lilac bushes at our house so I learned that smell early on. The thing I loved most about lilacs was that their fragrance signaled the end of the school year and the start of summer vacation.
Take a Hike
If you truly want to embrace spring, you might need to take a hike somewhere. We certainly did back then. We could hike right up to the top of Memorial Park from our back yard. We climbed the bluff all year but spring was special because the winter cold and snow were gone. We could wear light jackets again. The air was fresher just from furnaces running less. Birds were retuning and building nests.
Calendars often depict March as the windy month. They often show a picture of someone flying a kite. I loved flying kites but I don’t remember flying them in March. We were usually still shoveling. There were springs that had to battle a reluctant winter. Nice weather, buds coming out and then we’d get a below-freezing cold snap, often with a load of snow. I remember shoveling a foot of wet, heavy snow on May first and frosts after the corn had sprouted.
Spring was when Dad swapped the snow tires for summer tires. It also meant raking. I disliked raking in the fall but in the spring it was just unfair. The leaves that had blown into flower beds and along the bushes were wet, heavy and smelled bad. It was worse than fall raking except that we didn’t have to rake the whole yard.
Spring holds special memories. But the best part of spring was that summer was just around the corner.