Thoughts of April

About six months ago I wrote a Hub, "Thoughts of September". In the Boston area, where I live, September is a beautiful month. The trouble with September (at least in Massachusetts) is that those of us who despise Winter usually see a real "down side" to even the most beautiful September weather. There's no doubt about it; September is a strikingly beautiful month here. April, though - now, April is the month in which I come alive. April is MY month.

I'm well beyond the age when I care at all about my own birthday, but I think my mother's oft told story about bringing her new baby (me) home from the hospital may have played some role in my growing up under the impression that my role in life was to accompany Spring, usher in Spring, be Spring, or somehow just be associated with Spring. My mother would tell the story of how, when she went to the hospital to have me, she wore her Winter coat; and how when she brought me home, it was a beautiful, warm, day and the forsythia were "all in bloom".

That's a different story from the one I have for my November-baby son. That story involves my baby being born on a windy and cold (but sunny) November day and my finally bringing him home, weeks later, on an even colder and windier day. The story I have for my daughter involves going to have her on a January-thaw day that was over 50 degrees but involved lots of melting snow and downpours that had begun to freeze by the time I went to the hospital. I brought her home in the snow, so I've always made sure to highlight the fact that I held up her pink blanket to show a neighbor, sitting at her window and watching, that I had had a little girl. I don't have a birth story for my eldest son because someone else gave birth to him. I do, however, have great stories about all those Summer, outdoor, perfect-weather, birthday parties my "August baby" was able to have.

My mother's talk of bringing me home and seeing "all the forsythia everywhere" probably didn't help my older sister's thoughts of her own birth month (November), especially since my mother would say, "When I went in to have her it was a cold, cold, day; and it was cold and raw when I brought her home." With my younger brother, the story wasn't a story at all. He was born in the middle of beautiful Spring weather and brought home in equally beautiful weather. Of course, I was born after my mother had had a particularly "bad", late miscarriage; so I imagine that forsythia may have been symbolic for her.

My sister and I have always joked that her birth month is pretty much the grayest month of the year (television meteorologists have confirmed that to be a scientific fact), and we've joked about how I got a "good" birthstone (diamond) while she got a "rotten" birthstone (her opinion, not mine) (topaz). Of course, I grew up kind of wondering if the gods gave me that "good" birth month as a way to make up for the fact that I would be neither a first-born nor a youngest child.

Since we've been grown, my sister and I have continued to bemoan the miserable-ness of November. You'd think I would have happy memories of November, considering my son was born in that month (and I do); but he was a premie, so my memory of that particular November involved weeks of worrying about my tiny baby. What's worse about November is that both my parents died in November (one on Thanksgiving, one the day before). No matter how long it's been, my sister and I both kind of hate that "cloud" that seems to settle overhead in November - but none of these thoughts are thoughts of April. That's the thing, April is a whole different kind of month.

Even with the romanticized image of "April showers bringing May flowers", let's be honest - where I live, April can bring a lot of really rotten (and very un-Spring-like) weather. The term, "April showers", brings to mind the soft rain that really only comes in late Spring, Summer, and Early Autumn. April showers, in fact, are depressing rain in raw temperatures. April doesn't just have it's raw rain either. It often has little remnants (or more) of hanger-on snow that's so dirty it's hard to know if it's a snow pile or a dirt pile. Awhile back we had "The April Fools' Day Blizzard." Speaking of April Fools' Day, it isn't exactly a "lovely" or appealing thing to usher in a month. "May Day" is lovely. Independence Day is quite the holiday. It doesn't usher in June, but Flag Day is a nice thing June has. For those of us born in April, and who celebrate it, Easter can sometimes fall on our birthday. That's fun when you're a kid anyway.

It's in April when melting snow and rain often mean flooded basements and streets. It's really not a good idea to put away the Winter gloves in April.

The point is that April sounds a lot nicer than it really is, at least weather-wise.

Still, April is MY month. April, with its sparkling diamond as a birthstone, Sweet Pea as its flower, and name that's pretty enough for some people to name their daughters after it, is the month I wait for all through the Winter. It's when, no matter how many of those April birthdays I've had, I feel young. There's something about April that kind of magically lets me wake up without an alarm clock (and feel great when I do, at that). It really is about having those beautiful May and June flowers and flowering trees in pinks, lilacs, and whites to look forward to. I do wish April had some of those pinks and whites in its landscape, but the yellow of the forsythia can seem like the yellow of the sun (which can be so rare, not only in Winter but in April, as well).

Without full-bloom leaves on trees, and with so many gray days, those first, reddish, forsythia buds are a welcome site; and the splash of yellow of forsythia in bloom somehow seem to confirm that Winter is well and gone, to be tucked away for a time that lasts far longer than Winter, itself, lasts.

Some people start to worry about diet and exercising a little more because they worry about how they'll look in their bathing suits. For me, the longing to exercise isn't about weight or looks. It's about a burst of energy that I've never quite understood. I suppose it could be that my Winter blahs and being cold all the time are over, while my late Summer goldenrod allergy isn't sapping my energy. I don't think so, though. It seems to me it's more about "something in the air" during April, rather than "something not in the air".

What I wonder, though, is how can there be "something in the air" about a month that so often involves cold, raw, weather; flooding, and trees that don't look all that much more "Spring-y" than they did in Winter. Is it about the promise of May and June (just about the most perfect months of the year), or about fantasizing about the "perfection" of Summer? I suppose there's some element of looking forward while overlooking the present (which is the opposite of what I do in September, when I tend to overlook a beautiful present and, instead, become depressed about what's to come).

My sister and I have often thought how interesting (or at least mildly interesting) it is that she happens to find the beautiful colors of Autumn her favorites, and that she has coloring that means she looks nicest in clothes and make-up in colors with "roots" in Autumn colors. My coloring, however, makes me look and feel best in Spring colors, and my favorite flowers are always in colors associated with Spring. As someone who hates the hot weather, my sister is someone who says, "Fall is MY time of year."

Spring, though, is my time of year. I am Spring. I feel like Spring. I thrive in Spring. More specifically, and perhaps more appropriate to my life, April is me. It's my month, and it has nothing to do with the fact that I was born in April (at least I don't think it does). April is a month that's about ignoring some heavy rains, enjoying the mild (as compared to numbing) chill, and being delighted to see those bright bursts of yellow forsythia that tell me (even if yellow isn't one of my favorite colors) I've arrived home after a trying journey through Winter.

The thing about April is that just when Winter gets to seem so long it can make me wonder if I'll ever find my way home again, April reminds me that, even through the long Winter, I've been home all along. From what I've heard, the bright yellow forsythia were "all around" to greet me when I was first brought home so many years ago. To have heard my mother tell it, one would think I was the one to bring on the Spring (at least that year). Maybe that's the "deep psychological" reason I see Valentine's Day as the first sign that Spring is one the way, and "proclaim" (at least to anyone with range of hearing my "proclamation") that March 1 is the first day of Spring. (I recently learned that March 1 actually is, in meteorological circles, the first day of Spring, so that, at least, helps keep me from seeming too out-of-touch with reality when I "deem" March 1 as my own first day of Spring.)

Let's face it - April doesn't really have the greatest weather of the year, and the beauty of forsythia bushes is really more about the bright color than anything else. No matter how long I've in lived New England, every Winter I have visions of April being far nicer than it really is; and every April I re-discover that April is often about cold and mud and left-over dirty snow. It doesn't matter, though. April is also about the first real refuge from Winter. It's about the promise of what is to come; and the common forsythia bush - while not in the least way rare or even particularly beautiful - doesn't just signal the arrival of Spring. Its color arrives earlier than most other colors. It's so much more noticeable than the crocus is - and forsythia is strong enough that is doesn't need the warmth of May or June in order to bloom.

I suppose if I'd been given the choice regarding birth month, I would have chosen May, June, or even September. It would just be nice to have such a beautiful month to call "my own". None of those months, however, quite so represent promise as April does. April is, in its own way, deceptively Winter like. It is also, however, about the Sweet Pea, the forsythia, diamonds being beautiful and forever, those proverbial April showers, and sometimes even the Easter bunny. April isn't bold and showy, but it's fresh and new and cool - and so much kinder than November.

Like the bright yellow forsythia that seems to bloom overnight, April is about the promise of Spring fulfilled, but also the promise of things to come. It's about the clarity of diamonds and Spring rain, and about putting away the heavy Winter coats and feeling just a little more free (a feeling we can take for granted once April is over). Sure, each April I have to face growing one year older, but it doesn't matter. April is my month. I am April. Somehow, in spite of birthdays and Winters, dirty snow and floods, April brings a sense of promises fulfilled and to be fulfilled. Yes, April is a very good month.

THE ROSEBUSH BY THE CHIMNEY

(Note: This is a story I wrote years ago and dug out for this Hub.)

Our family home was built in the early 1960's when builders paid less attention to leaving a few trees in new housing developments. As a result, the yard - and the little strip of soil in front of its wide, straight, chimney - got a lot of light. Having moved to the new house from one on a tree-lined street, my father's first order of business was to begin putting in some trees, shrubs, and a few flowering bushes. We had moved from a large house that had become a little too much for my late-middle-aged father to care for, so the new, smaller, house meant he wouldn't be doing the kind of repairs that are needed in large, older, homes. He had done his share of home repairs for years, and now he was able to enjoy the brand, new, house with no work to do other than gardening and mowing the lawn.

The house is in New England, so there was only so much time for planting trees and shrubs the first year or so. After he and my mother had shopped for just the right trees, shrubs, and flowering bushes; and after they had been planted, the house no longer looked as if it was sitting on a vacant expanse of sand. My parents liked roses, so my father planted a row of rose bushes across one part of the yard. They were pale pink roses, looked nice, and did well; but because my father had a "thing" for yellow roses he picked up a rosebush that would have large, pale, yellow, roses, and he planted it on the little strip of soil by the chimney. Since the chimney is located near the back steps the yellow roses warmed up the look of the dark bricks and created a pretty accent at the edge of the flagstone walk that curved from the driveway and around to the back stairs. My father took care of his favorite rosebush, but my mother would care for it at times when he was working. Unlike the way she usually referred to the things in the yard as "ours," my mother always called the yellow rosebush, "Dad's rosebush".

When blooming season arrived in 1973 "Dad's rosebush" didn't bloom. He and my mother made the occasional comment about what may have been wrong with it that year, but by the time they really realized it wouldn't be blooming summer was far enough into progress that I my father had kind of accepted that it wouldn't bloom and that he'd have to, maybe, move it. Over the years since the house had been built trees around it had grown tall enough to have begun blocking the sun, so my father assumed that could have stopped the rosebush from blooming that year. Maybe he wasn't feeling well that summer because in October he had a heart attack that was caused by coronary thrombosis, and he remained hospitalized until the end of November when he passed away. My mother, sister, brother, and I returned to the house after being at the hospital on that unseasonably warm, sunny, November day; and as we walked from the driveway up the flagstone walk toward the back stairs we all stopped in our tracks. Dad's rosebush had one, huge, beautiful, yellow rose right near the top after a summer of no blooming whatsoever. My brother was a teenager and headed into the house, but my mother and sister and I stood and stared at the lovely yellow rose. Someone commented in a low, almost mystified, tone, "That's so strange, isn't it." Someone else, equally mystified, said, "It is." It happened to be Thanksgiving Day.

The rosebush never bloomed again, but my mother didn't want to move my father's

rosebush. She tried giving it better soil and feeding it the first couple of years after my father died, but when none of that worked she just accepted that the bush by the chimney would sit silently at the edge of the walk without its yellow roses. From time to time we would mention the way one yellow rose had bloomed late in November, when the only conclusion that I could draw after all those unanswered prayers was that there must be no God at all.

My mother, brother, sister, and I must have passed by the rosebush thousands and thousands of times over the years. Grandchildren came along - nine of them eventually - and they, too, would pass by their grandfather's silent rosebush without even noticing it. We, grown-ups, love it, though, even without roses. We knew it was somehow and in some strange way a precious reminder of the loving man for whom it had bloomed so beautifully for all those better years and over whom it seemed to refuse to bloom that summer when he didn't feel well and didn't say much about it. As time went on the rosebush grew thinner and more spindly. I wasn't living at the house, so I didn't think much about doing anything to bring it back.

Over two decades passed, and after fifteen months of being bedridden my mother died the day before Thanksgiving. Families sometimes have their times when all the awful things hit over a short period of time, and when my mother died it was after one of those periods of time when a number of awful things had happened in a string of what

seemed unending cruelties of life. Within weeks after she died New England had terrible ice storms. Houses were covered with ice, trees had ice-covered limbs bent down and stuck in the ice that covered that ground. It seemed there were days of grayness, and the ice wasn't sparkling ice that comes when a little rain freezes on the trees. This ice was thick, heavy, solid, unmovable, ice that had the white look of old ice. Having lost our mother only weeks earlier, my sister and I felt as if we were living with cold, gray, death within us and around us, with no sign of ever feeling warm again. As all grieving people do, though, we went through the motions. Every week she and I would go for coffee before shopping and try, together, to go over all the thoughts onto which we could cling to keep from feeling more awful than we already did.

It was a Sunday afternoon when she and I returned to the house late in the afternoon. Daylight-savings time had been over for months by then. As we walked up the flagstone walk in the fading afternoon light we stopped - as we had done over two decades earlier - because up through the ice, which covered not just some things around the yard but everything everywhere, peeked a bright green stem with the tiniest of green leaves. As we looked more closely we could see the rosebush under the white ice, but green and new. What we couldn't understand was how - through all that thick, solid, ice that seemed destined to stay around forever - could the slender little green stem with its tiniest of new leaves have found the strength and found its way up and out into the afternoon air? In the still of the dead-of-Winter cold and the quiet surroundings one of us said (I don’t recall which), "Isn't that strange." The other replied simply, "It is."

The rosebush by the chimney should have been moved that year my father had talked about moving it. He never got around to it, and trees came - but a couple of those trees have gone as well. I don't want to try to move it at this point. Things change. Things endure. Last week I cleared away the leaves that accumulated around it. I'll feed it again this year. More light can get to it now. You would think in all these years I would have given up believing that one day the silent rosebush by the chimney will bloom again. The thing is, I've seen how it has endured, and I remember its beautiful yellow roses.

It would be better if I could end this story by telling you the rosebush went on to bloom again, but the truth is – at least thus far – it has not done that. Whenever I’ve had the chance I’ve gone over there and thrown in some plant food from time to time, but life – in all its “busy-ness” – hasn’t afforded me the time to spend on something that has survived, but not thrived, in spite of being planted by the chimney, where it would eventually not get the sun it needed to bloom. Sure, I’d like to see my father’s roses bloom once again one day; but, for now, remembering will have to do. The point of this story, however, is not about overcoming extreme horticultural challenges; and it isn’t even about a seemingly fragile rosebush that has survived for more than three decades. The point of this story is that, buried in a world that seemed made of ice so solid nothing but the springtime sun could ever budge it, the stem and its few leaves had managed to make their way through the feet of solid ice. What’s more, the bright green of the stem and leaves seemed to flaunt their aliveness at the cold white of snow and ice, reminding my grieving sister and me that no matter how rock- solid and immovable all that ice was, it was no match for the enduring and very-much-alive rosebush. It is often said that all that glitters is not gold. It seems, too, that all that is enduring is not always a showy display of beautiful yellow roses; and all that seems fragile is not always anywhere near as fragile as it seems.