Its hard not to feel a bit better about life, no matter how gloomy its personal aspects right now, when all of the trees are in bloom and the birds are coming back. (Fortunately, so far, not our woodpecker friend.) I love sitting in on our back porch and watching all the action.
Next week we will have lived in Tennessee for 13 years. By my math, this is the longest I have lived in any single city, which seems somewhat surprising to me. Its probably springtime in Tennessee that keeps us here.
Springtime is both the most beautiful time of the year in Tennessee and the most dangerous. Perhaps the two go together. Spring really starts in February when the first flowers like tulips starts coming up and I suppose ends somewhere around the middle of May when school ends and the high humid summer set in. The warmth and rain trigger all the new growth, but the instability of the weather patterns bring heavy rain, tornadoes, and thunderstorms. Having seen the devastation of the first two, I was contemplating the possible effects of the third as I was riding home on my bike Thursday night. The lightning strikes were awesome, majestic and jagged, but I couldn't help but be afraid that if one directly hit in the vicinity around me, I would probably be toast, literally. Fortunately, my string of adverse events was not extended and I made it home safe, if entirely soaking wet.
