Any Day Now

     I’ve been watching the daffodils across the street.  They have been almost-but-not quite strutting their stuff for a week now.  I’ve always thought of them as cheerful, prim, and proper – the advanced sentinels of Spring, standing at frilly attention around the garden beds of town.  Who knew they were such teases?
     Last year the first blooms appeared on February 8^th – or so Bradley tells me.  I have no reason to doubt him.  He is young, his mind is clear, and he remembers things like that.  So, yesterday I expected, if not a riot, at least a rumble, of color.  They looked ready to burst into glory several days ago and we’ve had all that good weather.  But no…
     Hyacinths, too, are marching in raggedy formation around our garden, but it will be a few weeks before they show their purple topknots.  I’m pretty sure the daffodils will beat them but, at this rate, I’m not placing any bets.  Even our camellias have fat pink buds already.
     I haven’t thought to check out Jean’s big tub of tulips next door to the post office. She’s the only one in the village who manages to grow them successfully.  Somehow, she has trained the deer to leave them alone.  I’ve never asked her secret; I rather like it that hers are the only ones in Oysterville.  Their colorful blossoms will come later but perhaps their sturdy green stems are poking through the soil now.
     Meanwhile, the old Mother Goose rhyme echoes in my head, ready for reciting:
                    Daffadowndilly
                    Has come to town,
                    In a yellow petticoat
                    And a green gown.

      Maybe today?