Minnesota Prairie Roots

Looking skyward in my Faribault, Minnesota, backyard Monday morning.

HOW DO YOU define spring?

By the calendar? By tulips, daffodils, crocuses popping color into the landscape? By warmth?

A sure sign of spring in Minnesota: More motorcyclists on the roads, as reflected in this photo taken late Saturday afternoon.

Whatever your measurement of spring, it’s likely as personal as you are and reflects wherever you live.

I’ve lived all of my life in Minnesota, a state associated with cold and snow. Long winters. And this winter, especially, has been long with way above average snowfall in February. Finally, in recent weeks, temps warmed and snow melted with amazing speed. It’s beginning to feel and look more spring-like. Temps today are predicted to reach into the 60s.

Emerging in a south-facing flowerbed in my backyard Monday morning. Every year my tulips start to grow and then snow falls in April and, well, that’s not good. I expect no different this year.

First signs of spring for me may seem atypical. I look beyond flower bulb leaves emerging from the cover of leaf mulch.

A cloud of dust envelopes the street sweeper cleaning Willow Street Monday morning.

I see spring in the street sweeper roaring past my house, sucking up sand, dirt and other winter debris from roadways.

I see spring in our Christmas tree now uncovered, dried and dead, from a snowbank.

Aiming my camera lens directly upward to the sky from my backyard Monday morning.

I see spring in puffs of clouds against a sky morphed from the grey of winter to a sharp blue.

Flooded fields photographed Saturday morning in southern Minnesota.

I see spring in intense blue pools of water forming lakes in farm fields as the snow melts.

Typically, I would already have hung out laundry in 2019. But this year a snow-covered patio and too much snowfall and cold temps delayed that. Randy shoveled snow from the patio several days ago so I could hang out laundry Monday morning. That’s our Weber grill on the other side of the snowbank next to the clothesline.

I see spring in the laundry I now hang on the line, for the first time Monday morning. After the husband shoveled snow from the patio.

One of my favorite prints, picked up at a garage sale a number of years back.

I see spring, too, in the artwork I pull from my personal collection. Pastoral scenes that offer no hint of winter.

I appreciate that I can now find asparagus, one of my favorite vegetables, in local grocery stores.

I see spring in the bundle of asparagus I picked up at the grocery store. I can’t wait until locally-grown asparagus is available.

These things, for me, signal spring. How about you? Tell me what hearkens spring’s arrival for you.

© Copyright 2019 Audrey Kletscher Helbling