Now that I’ve lived in Maine for nearly five years, I find that I make excuses for its weather. Every time my folks call from Arizona and ask if it’s cold, I snap, “It’s winter! It’s not normal to be playing golf, and that’s why all of your friends are having basal cells removed!”
I justify its bobbing temperature, all the while staring at a calendar trying to figure out if Daylight Savings Time actually meant extending winter for another year or two. When the pictures of vernal celebrations begin to unspool on Facebook, I remind myself, with as sage a tone as one can who never figured out the conversion to Celsius the entire year she studied abroad, that spring is always late to the party.
I learned this my first year in Maine. It was a brutal first winter on which to cut my teeth. The bitter temperatures were unrelenting and heavy snow dumped upon the coast for days at a time.
“Wisdom comes with winters,” I muttered often. And it did.
I grew wise to many things I had previously considered lore, like black ice and lethal icicles plummeting from rooftops. I also learned of the crowning jewel of coastal winters: the snowy mix. Nothing makes dressing, driving, walking and choosing to go on living more difficult than a snowy mix.
Through the hardship of winter, though, I learned of its requiem: spring. In places I have previously lived, spring arrives like a parade. The throngs of people eagerly wait for it to begin, and just when you think you have enough time to duck inside a restaurant to use the facilities, it’s marching by.
Spring arrives differently in Maine. The grip of winter eases hesitantly and with several false starts. Snow boots become rain boots and then snow boots again. We prepare with equal diligence for Easter and nor’easter. As the states to the south of us boast their cherry blossoms and open-toed footwear, those of us in the glacial arm of the country are still existing on chili and wondering if we might as well plan for a second Christmas.
School releases for Spring Break, a confident moniker albeit a much less ominous title than its precursor, February Break. There isn’t the same clamorous exit from Maine during this week. You can face your fellow townspeople the week before without fear of hearing their plans of treason, which include traitorous words like “San Diego” and “Florida.”
While we’re not yet taking a break from spring, it’s the break we need to start searching for it. Spring is no easy find here. It beckons quietly, probably because it’s covered by mud, and we’re forced to scour our surrounds for earnest signs of it. At long last, we take note that the snow-hardened earth has waged its land grab upon the slush. Animals long forgotten make their presence known by rummaging through the garbage again. Ten layers dwindle to two or three. Crock pots resume their post as storage for pens and unpaid bills. We see the top of the mailbox again.
Spring in Maine allows for the sort of reflection typically mustered at the start of a new year. It brings time for introspection and a renewal that comes with not wearing flannel for extended periods. To take an ambling walk under sunlight and to glimpse a harbor that has broken up its last floes of ice reminds us that while it’s still cold, it won’t stay this way.
Now that the first day of spring has come, you can relish in the victory of having outlasted another winter. You can relocate the down jackets and shovels to the recesses of the garage. You can spruce up and make space, both within your home and yourself. You can consider converting your mudroom into a sauna or a guest bedroom.
Just as the fever of spring really invades you, as you are standing proudly in your home which has been denuded of the trappings of winter, admiring the lightness that spring cleaning affords, a voice emanating from the television seizes your attention: 6 to 8 inches of snow on Tuesday.
And you remember that spring in Maine is just winter everywhere else.