Spring has sprung! The quick and unscientific explanation of Spring Equinox is that the days will finally have more sunlight hours than nighttime hours. But this is only if you are in the Northern Hemisphere, syke Southern Hemi. This was the earliest Spring Equinox in 120 years. Why you ask? Because of it being a leap year. Why does that matter? Again a bunch of boring Gregorian calendar stuff dating back to 1562 and really it has nothing even remotely to do with shoes. Here’s the short of it; spring happened ¾ a day earlier. Did you feel the change? It’s like an earthquake under 1.5 on the Richter scale, no one notices.
Why does all this matter? Quick botany lesson, a lot of plants (especially the one’s we like for food) need more hours of sunlight to trigger their internal clocks to bloom. They stay dormant until sunshine hours are longer. The opposite is true for poinsettias; they are triggered to bloom when there are less daylight hours, which is why we have poinsettias during December, because the daylight hours are short. Of course all of this can be manipulated now with electricity.
But Spring by its very nature means the end of hibernation. It sparks hopefulness in humans as well as blooming plants. Look up Ode to Spring on the Internet, your search will trigger about a billion songs, poems, essays etc… Most of these homages to Spring will have Beethoven’s Ode to Joy as back ground music. Which is a solid choice if only slightly cliché’. It’s still a marvelous piece of musical genius. People love the hope that comes with longer warmer days. I get it. I love long warm days too. I have lived entire my life in SoCal. But I have been in some pretty hash weather. I get it. Winter sucks!
I raise my ceremonial imaginary glass to you Spring. I too am hopeful by the increase in sunshine in my life. May all your plants literally and figuratively flourish! Oh and we are only one week away from being able to wear white shoes, if you follow such things. Happy Spring!
Laura
