FEBRUARY INFIRMITY

You would think at my age I would have learned to cope with Spring Fever a little better than I do.  The truth is, though, it gets a little worse every year,

I’ve thought about this a lot (while standing in the sunbeams from my big south-facing picture window) trying to sort out whether this is because the illness strengthens as time goes by, or because I am getting older and more susceptible to its contagion.  I suppose it may be a bit of both.

The main symptom is the longing for anything green and growing.  I have one large-ish house plant that stalwartly refuses to die, and even treats me to the odd new frond from time to time.  It’s green, and growing, and I admire its tenacity, but by mid February it’s just not enough.  The sun spends more time in the sky, the seed catalogues are all here, the potatoes are sprouting in the basement – stuff wants to grow and I want to grow it!

Let me just say that planting seeds in mid February is great if you want spindly, weak-kneed seedlings in a couple weeks.  I know this because I am a repeat offender.  This is too early if you have nowhere but a little table in a south window to put them.  You need a better set up and more space.

So, two years ago my enabler built me a two tier shelf to sit up by that window.  I went hog wild and planted everything I could think of.  The seeds grew and needed to be transplanted into larger containers.  My enabler went out and built me another two tier shelving unit.  The shelves were all full.  The window was all full.  On the one hand things were green and growing and reasonably sturdy; on the other hand it was now only the end of March and still weeks from being safe to put the babies outside in the ground.  Although most of them did survive till their garden debut the shock of moving such large plants to a new environment set them back considerably. 

Like about a month.  Like about the exact amount of time I should have waited to plant them in the first place.

Last year my enabler went out and built me a small greenhouse in the back yard.  I’m not sure of his motivation.  Was it the nuisance of two shelving units over flowing with plants in the living room for three months the year before?  Was it that he just loves going bigger and better?  Was he just bored one day and thought he should build a greenhouse?  Or was it his farmer genetics kicking in; it this how male spring fever manifests itself?

At any rate, in came the two shelving units and the starter soil and the seeds.  Now that I had somewhere to move the seedlings to once a reasonable temperature could be maintained with heaters out in my new playhouse there was no need to hold back.  Well, except for that still-way-too-early thing. 

It’s so hard, in the throes of spring fever, to keep the soil away from the seeds and the sunshine.  One thinks “oh just this one little package won’t hurt anything” and the next thing you know there are several small forests of seedlings.  And in the process of transplanting these many babies to larger containers they lose touch with their name tags so you don’t even know who’s who by the time you move them to the greenhouse.  And it ends up there are way too many of the short things and not enough of the tall ones.  If I learned anything last year when dealing with such abundance it was to WRITE THINGS DOWN.

So, how am I doing so far this winter, you ask?

Well, so far only one of my window shelves has made into the house and only a few perennials have been planted.  I have several baby lemon trees doing great and out of curiosity I planted grape seeds to see if they would sprout too.  There are no fast growing annuals anywhere close to dirt at this time.  My restraint impresses even me.  I had even thought maybe I had developed some kind of immunity to Spring Fever’s pathogen.

That was until I was doing laundry this morning.  As I pulled the clothes out of the washing machine and tossed them in the dryer door I happened to glance out that big window that overlooks my backyard.  It wasn’t the greenhouse that caught my eye, it was my clothesline.  Obviously missing green, growing things is only one facet of this disease.

One of the prime indicators of Spring Fever is heavy, wistful sighing.  It’s all downhill from here.

*Sigh* I can’t wait to smell sheets and towels hung outside to dry.

*Sigh*