Did Someone Say Spring?

I love spring. 

photo © Janice Lang 

I hate spring. 

My feelings are about as ambivalent as the weather here in Central Connecticut. Winter is my least favorite season, so it goes without saying that come the Vernal Equinox, I should be jumping for joy. The days are longer (Daylight Savings Time notwithstanding). There’s even a change in the quality of the light, warmer, brighter. Snow drops and crocuses, which often make their first anxious appearance in late February (only to disappear again and again under mountains of wet, heavy snow) are now blooming. Finally. Daffodils and irises are forming buds. Peonies are pushing up through the soil. At this time of year, the snow doesn’t linger very long. Still nights can get pretty cold, making for treacherous walkies when the doggie needs to go out for her “last whizz” before bedtime.

As T.S. Eliot said in The Waste Land, “April is the cruelest month.” Being a Taurus and April-born, I used to take exception to that bit. But, no longer. In recent years, it’s as if Mother Nature can’t make up her mind. I remember Aprils with summer-like heat—90+ degrees—and Aprils when it seemed as if Old Man Winter was having too much fun to step aside. This year is the latter.

Of Mark Twain’s famous adage, “If you don’t like the weather in New England, wait five minutes” he knew what he was talking about. He lived for a time in Hartford, not far from our home. Speaking of Twain, he also said the following:

In the spring I have counted one hundred and thirty-six different kinds of weather inside of four-and-twenty hours. It was I that made the fame and fortune of that man that had that marvelous collection of weather on exhibition at the Centennial, that so astounded the foreigners. He was going to travel all over the world and get specimens from all the climes. I said, “Don’t you do it; you come to New England on a favorable spring day.” I told him what we could do in the way of style, variety, and quantity. Well, he came and he made his collection in four days. As to variety, why, he confessed that he got hundreds of kinds of weather that he had never heard of before. And as to quantity—well, after he had picked out and discarded all that was blemished in any way, he not only had weather enough, but weather to spare; weather to hire out; weather to sell; to deposit; weather to invest; weather to give to the poor.

Come May, the weather should begin to settle down. We are gardeners here, grow veggies and herbs, some of the tender variety. So we wait until the last threat of frost is gone, usually by Memorial Day, at which time my husband optimistically opens the pool for the season. Some years we take a chance, if the temps are what we used to refer to as “seasonable” to plant our zucs and cukes, peas, tomatoes, and peppers a bit earlier. Alas, these early plantings are becoming a thing of the past.

Frankly, there is no such thing as spring in Connecticut of the kind I remember from childhood. We go from winter straight to summer. This always catches us off guard. One day we’re bundled in thermals and thick socks, boots and parkas, the next day we’re scrambling to find shorts, t-shirts and sandals.

My memories of spring from an earlier era are fond ones. My mother loved lilacs and planted them in a row along a rail fence in our yard. When ours bloom around Mother’s Day, the heavenly scent speaks to me in my mother’s voice. The colors of spring, that new green and the red and yellow casts around the maples and willows against an otherwise stark landscape make me nostalgic for my younger days when the seasons knew their place.

~*~

Kathy Fischer Brown is a BWL author of historical novels, Winter Fire, Lord Esterleigh's Daughter, Courting the Devil, The Partisan's Wife, and The Return of Tachlanad, her latest release, an epic fantasy adventure for young adult and adult readers. Check out her The Books We Love Authorpage or visit her website. All of Kathy’s books are available in e-book and in paperback from Amazon. Look for Where the River Narrows(Quebec), book 12 of the Canadian Historical Brides collection, with Ron Crouch, coming in July.

 

One Cat Short of...

Fly Away Snow Goose

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Books We Love

Well, Michelle, our intrepid cover artist, suggested "writing companions" for our March blog topic--so here goes, from a writer who is (and has been) as you shall see, just one cat short of crazy.

The first, the calico girl admiring the fishies, was taken almost twenty-five years ago. It's Stanzi Marie Pussycat, who was a retiring lady, as torties often are. When I got her from the Humane Society, the gal at the desk replied wearily --I'd asked if Stanzi was pregnant--"They're all pregnant." Fortunately for us, she wasn't.  I gave her Mozart's Wife's sweet nickname, the same bestowed by her "Little Husband."  She spent a lot of time rolling around on the floor next to me while I wrote, chirruping: "Please get down and pet me, Mom!" while I was concentrating--or attempting to.   

"Mrs. Washington has a mottled orange tomcat, who she calls, in a complimentary way, Hamilton..." (Such an elegant diss for the rebel general's favorite aide de camp from the Tory newspapers!) This Hammie usually slept on my head, but like the original Hamilton, he was a charming, gay (tho secretly tender-hearted) fellow. He arrived via a free paper ad, where a young woman simply posted: "Help me. I have thirty-eight cats." 

Hammie was the one who climbed into my lap when I sat on the ground to admire the furry gang gathering around. I patted him, and he purred. Then he bit me, really hard, in the arm, and ran away--just a few feet--to anxiously study me. The rescuer observed, "He doesn't mean it."  I knew he didn't, so I took him home. He performed his keyboard blocking, head butting, standing on the keyboard, drinking out of my water glass cat duties for Mozart's Wife, A Master Passion, Angel's Flight and Genesee.  

Here is another Revolutionary War period cat, Major General Schuyler, or "Sky-Sky." A scrawny fellow, he reached out to my husband and me through the bars, meowing "take me home!" His tail had been broken in multiple places, so that it felt, when you ran your fingers over it, "like fifteen miles o' bad road" as a friend's truck driver husband so aptly put it. He had a fondness for doughnuts, which, as you can see, eventually caught up with him. It was a taste he'd probably picked up on the streets of a nearby dead steel town, his place of origin.  Some kind person, knowing he was a good boy, had brought him into the shelter, hoping he'd find a home. You can tell from his name that my string of American Revolutionary War novels was still in progress. He was a good "Dutchman," fastidious about his appearance; his white fur always shone.

Next up, Elizabeth (Miss Betsy Schuyler--naturally!). She was dropped off in a pet shop, whose owner was a friend. Deb called me to say--through tears--that the women who'd left her behind had said, magisterially, "Here! You take her! Cats smother babies!" Then she'd walked out the door, leaving Lizzie behind, bewildered atop the counter. As you can see, Elizabeth was always super helpful when I was creating.  I soon learned to type while balancing her 8 lbs. atop my forearms...

Here's the Sainted Tycho, who came from our local PAWS. I had been cleaning cages at the Petsmart every Friday night for a year when I met him, one among an entire litter of black kittens who'd been rescued at a gun club. When I opened the cage door and allowed the babies to come tumbling out to romp in the narrow space we were allotted, this little boy, instead of chasing his playful siblings, climbed onto my shoulder, leaned against my head and began a heartfelt purr--it was love at first sight. He didn't live long, but for a few precious years, he was a fragment of the Divine, briefly embodied in a black cat. His companionship helped me to survive a crash and burn health crisis.    

This is cat is not one of mine. I met him at the Schuyler Mansion in Albany, where he was greeting visitors to Major General Schuyler's stylish Georgian Home, making fellow 18th Century/Rev War author Kathy Fischer-Brown and I feel welcome as we approached the lovely old place.  He's another dapper iteration of the Hamiltonian orange tom cat gene. Delightful serendipity! 

B0B--the heartache of losing this big handsome tiger, just last November, is still fresh. He was a boy from the 'hood, tough and swaggering, a whole Tom when he introduced himself to us, yet always gentle. He loved to be petted. ("So happy I could just drool" became a saying around here.) I cannot number the dead critters he deposited on our door step during the decade our home was privileged to be his designated crash pad. (Never let it be said that B0B didn't know how to say "thanks" to his faithful posse!)  I still miss being awoken at 2 a.m. every night by his yells of "Lemme in!" from the porch roof below my bedroom window. Ever your servant, Lord B0B! I would stagger downstairs and wait while he climbed down the tree and sauntered to the open door. Fly Away Snow Goose was created under his sway, because it's hard to get back to sleep when you are awoken in the middle of the night. Besides, I knew thatLemme in was often followed, around 4:30, by Lemme Out!

 "TES" or "Translucent Ear Syndrome" (Bon mot courtesy of author K.A .Corlett.)

Soft kitties, warm kitties...

Kimi-wah only recently decided she didn't have to hide all day. I can't credit her with a lot of writing face time, our PTSD pud! She does have a late afternoon trick of rubbing on my legs while I work, which is pleasant, and a whiny plaintive meow, not so much. The meow summons me to get down on the floor for some concerted attention. (She obviously thinks I need a break.) My husband and I are both relieved that after a mere 8 years of TLC, she's decided we're trustworthy. 

Same couch, different year, Caturday. (I was skinnier, too!) 

And last, here's Willeford, the Waldrons' most recent rescue. He's a semi-disabled elder, and our latest fur friend, named by the shelter. The name's now morphing into "Sweet William,"or "Will-Yum. He just finished biting me up and down one arm and swatting me for good measure a bunch of times because he was cross that I would not let him lie on the keyboard while I was typing this.  Clearly, Will-Yum will be another capable writing "assistant." Maybe he'll help me finish Green Magic, or Moonshine's Bride...  

~~Juliet Waldron

Juliet Waldron's Historical Novels

(Believe it or not--that's not all the cats we've loved.)

In the Name of Love

By Kathy Fischer-Brown

I can’t say that I never did anything particularly memorable “in the name of love.” Whether a result of my aging brain or selective recall, I can think of nothing to write here about myself. So, I will relate a little story from family lore.

When my dad served in the navy during WWII, his fiancée (my mom) used to send him care packages of his favorite foods: stuff that would survive weeks—if not months—of travel from The Bronx until reaching the SS Virgo, his ship, somewhere in the South Pacific. She’d send him edibles such as salamis, crackers, and nuts in their shells. My father loved sweets: chocolates, chocolate pudding, Boston cream pie…you name it. Brownies were one of his particular weaknesses. My mother’s brownies especially. They were cakey but not dry, satisfyingly chocolatey, and chock full of walnuts.

So, at one point she decided to bake a batch and send it to him. This was in an age when there was no UPS where you could drop off your perishables, have them boxed in Styrofoam coolers and packed in dry ice. You couldn’t even track the package. And in war time, there was no guarantee that it would even reach its destination. Imagine, if you will, the condition in which they arrived. My dad often spoke of this, and how his taste buds had been so amped at the thought of a bite of a delicious brownie…or two or three accompanied by a luke warm glass of navy regulation reconstituted powdered milk. Until he got a gander at those brown and green mouldy bricks.

 ~*~

Kathy Fischer Brown is a BWL author of historical novels, Winter Fire, "The Serpent’s Tooth" trilogy: Lord Esterleigh’s Daughter, Courting the Devil, The Partisan’s Wife, and The Return of Tachlanad, an epic fantasy adventure for young adult and adult readers. Check out her Books We Love Author page or visit her website. All of Kathy’s books are available in e-book and in paperback from a host of online and brick and mortar retailers. Look for Where the River Narrows (with Ronald Ady Crouch), the 12^th and final novel in BWL’s Canadian Historical Brides series, coming in July 2018.