April love

It's going to be a challenge, getting through April. I've kept journals before paced to the unfolding of the seasons, and they always seem to founder in April. It's a siren song thing. My Lorelei is a blonde at a picnic blanket in a meadow. She's singing, seductively, the Pat Boone swooner: "A-pril love is for the very young. Ev'ry star's a wishing star that shines for you..."

And next thing I know, I've gone all goofy on daffodils and cherry blossoms and little beckoning buds. And birds. Phoebes and swallows are next, and if this warm spell goes on, what's to stop the brown thrashers and catbirds and towhees from pulling me out of bed and squandering my days? Just yesterday, I was transfixed by a flicker. That amazing Scaramouche regalia: black moustache, red nape, black shield, bars, and speckles on a field of brown. And right now it's a chickadee, hopefully singing its hinged "Hi-Hope!" note and now there's an answering one, pitched slightly lower. They're duetting, call and response. You know where this is going to lead.

"Sometimes an April day will suddenly bring showers..." (Oh, good, a dampening note. Maybe I can get some work done.) "...rain to grow the flowers for her first bouquet!" (Noooo!)

And suppose I get through April. How am I going to keep up with May? You know what's coming in May. Warblers and grosbeaks and wrens! (Oh my!) Orioles, veeries, and vireos! (Whoa!) Tanagers, bobolinks, wood thrushes! (Yikes!)

Relax. Take it bird by bird, as Annie Lamott says. One tulip at a time. You've got to April before you can May. So how do you April? Same way you Marched. This is National Pecan Month. It's also National Poetry Month, National Card and Letter Writing Month, Straw Hat Month, Autism Awareness Month, and Jazz Appreciation Month. It may even be Have a Picnic with Your Siren Month. Because "April love can slip right through your fingers, so if she's the one, don't let her run away..."

Nah, I'll probably let her. But I'll bring the pecans.