March Days

An old French proverb has it that only fools go barefoot in March. There have been days, this March, when temperatures have risen to the 60s, and it has been tempting to shed footwear for a long beach stroll. But last weekend, ferocious winds on Saturday night and early Sunday canceled ferries and downed trees and power lines. Then rain plummeted down, pouring through downspouts, forming great lakes on paved roads and mud patches on dirt roads. There was nothing inviting about walking — barefoot or not — in those rains.

But that’s the way it is with March. It’s a quixotic month. Some days it smiles in the way of spring and makes the pussy willows and the snowdrops bloom and the forsythia edge toward budding. Sometimes it growls in a forbidding way, letting everyone know that winter hasn’t quite gone by. In March, deciduous trees creak in the wind and evergreens sigh. They do little gentle sighing. Sighing, wistful winds come later — in April and May.

It’s rather nice, though, to have an in-between month like March to keep you on your toes (but preferably not barefoot toes). March is a month you have to stand up to if you would enjoy it. It’s a month in which to search out the first signs of spring and welcome them. But it’s a month that puts you in your place. It lets you know that neither farmers nor gardeners nor woodsmen nor beachcombers have any control at all over Nature.