a swedish spring

Felipe over at The Unseen Moon takes pleasure in pointing out that I am simultaneously predictable and contrary.

I suspect he is correct on both counts. Especially when it comes to themes for my essays.

It is Spring -- and here is a photograpgh of a primavera tree. I took a quick look at some of my earlier posts involving one of Mexico's most showy trees. Every year, I write about the contrast of these trees with their bright yellow blooms against our blue skies.

I almost missed this year's show. Actually, I did miss half of it entirely. The primavera blooms twice -- once in late February and again in April. As its Latin name tells us, it announces the arrival of Spring.

The first bloom has the most flair because the blossoms are not obscured by the leaves that emerge in the second bloom. And it was that first bloom that I missed entirely. It happened while I was in Oregon watching my planned India cruise sink lower each day in the sea.

I almost missed the second show, as well. I have been rather good at staying home, but not obsessively. That was helped by my SUV being in the body shop for almost a month. And when it returned, I limited my drives to laundry and food deliveries.

That is, until I drove to Manzanillo last Saturday. The drive was punctuated with yellow clouds of primarvera blossoms -- both in groves and as stand-alone specimens. Their presence made the trip more pleasant.

I do not know what it is about the primavera that causes almost everyone to wax poetic. Even the outlier curmudgeons who mutter about how messy they are will concede that they are pretty.

That they are. From an objective standard of beauty, they are one of God's admirable creations. The primavera could easily have been what the psalmist had in mind with: "Let all of the trees of the fields sing for joy." (Psalms 96:12)

But the primavera touches something deeper in me beyond its beauty.

Maybe it is that the trees remind me of the banks of King Alfred daffodils in the front yard of my Salem house. They heralded the promise of Spring -- the hope that everything, in fact, will turn out well.

And maybe that is it. Nature cycles through its dance with death and renewal. That combination of blue and yellow is evidence that life does go on.

The photograph at the top of this essay is a stand-alone tree in Melaque on Primavera Street. When I moved here, someone in authority decided the primavera that ran the full length of the street would be replaced with palm trees. For some reason, one or two primavera were spared. And this is one of those.

In these days of uncertainty, it is reassuring that life does go on. And we should take pleasure that one spared primavera still teaches us that lesson.