I Love Spring, NOT!

                Bah, spring!  Who needs it?  Not I. Take the fickleness of Ozark spring weather.  One day is frigid and windy.  The next day can lull one into a false sense of contentment with beautiful bright skies, warm lazy temperatures and chirping crickets.  Once I went to the hospital wearing a sleeveless dress to have a baby.  The temperature was eighty-five degrees.  The next day, I took my baby home in eleven inches of wet, icy snow.

         And, let us not forget the tornado factor of an Arkansas’ spring.  Everyday we can be under a watch and more than a few warnings.  The sky turns green and you can see the clouds whirling and churning.  There is usually a torrential rain that drives in a slanted path.  I keep my worried eyes on the sky for a twisting funnel cloud.  As long as the rain is bucketing down, I feel a bit safer.  It is when the rain stops and the wind is totally calm that I am frightened.  This is the condition we look for that tattles to us of an oncoming twister.

         Where does one go when one lives in a mobile home?  I have considered the six-inch rocky ditch at the front of my home for shelter, but that doesn’t seem to be the answer.  I have a musty, creaking shed in the back yard, but it is bursting at the seams and only sits on top of the muddy ground with no metal tie-downs.  Maybe the guinea coop might work as a safe shelter. At least I would have guinea company.  If it’s dark, they will be roosting up high and we could squat under them and hold on for dear life.  Never mind, I just remembered what’s under all those roosting quineas.  I don't want to be squatting in vomit-inducing feces and wet mildewed feed.  I certainly wouldn't want to have to listen to their incessant chattering while I intruded in their home.  Guess, I will just have to make a run for the car.  Once inside I can buckle up for safety, Turn on the radio of disaster updates, lay the soft, warm seat back, and ardently pray for air bag deployment if I should become airborne.

         I do, however, love spring’s dazzling array of colored blooms on flowers, multi-colored bushes, and an array trees in my eight-acre yard.  Buzzing bees flit from blossom to blossom.  Beautiful, graceful butterflies skip from place to place.  The sweet smell of the roses are breath-taking and the clean, sharp aroma of the various mints make me want to break off a leaf or two to chew.  And, I do this many times a day.  My tulips look as if God hand-painted them in every vivid hue of the palette.  The velvety purple iris look so stately in the back of  Taylor's Garden.  Each of my gardens are named primarily for my precious grandchildren. A few are named for beloved pets that are interred beneath the garden.  Charley the Cat's flower bed is the most unique.  His heart-shaped garden is bordered by hand-picked rocks from our property and planted with vivid red flowers.
         
              I hate the pollen, however.  It seems God has a wonderful sense of humor and while instilling in me the absolute irresistible urge to be outside, he also gifted me with the inability to peacefully coexist with pollen.  A walk from the car to the house can leave me with puffy, itchy, watery eyes.  I have such fits of sneezing, I often wet my pants!  After about five days the yellow pollen, musty molds, and invisible spores, I am left with a horrid, throbbing sinus infection complete with loud hacking coughs, a sundry of snortings, and a swollen face.

         But none of these things sends me to the hospital quite as regularly as the stinging wasps.  You guessed it.  The wasps absolutely worship me.  I must be sweeter than honey!  They seem to have tag matches stinging, chasing, and biting me at will. I can be found running helter-skelter around the yard and screeching for Rick when they are after me. There is nothing more terrifying to me than the deathly demented buzzing of the wasp. They get irritated if I get anywhere near their nests or when I try to spray them with that vile smelling poison.  They don't tend to just try to run me off.  They dive bomb me and will chase me for miles, well maybe only one mile.  I am much too feeble to run more than a mile, so I can only guess at their ability.

         Saying that I am allergic to these deadly varmints is an understatement.  I can get violently ill with streams of red rashes shooting up and down my limbs.  I have arrived at the hospital uncontrollably wheezing and at the crisis stage.  One time I used ice packs on the sting and did fairly well.  The next morning, however, I couldn't get out of bed because all my joints were swollen and excruciatingly painful.  I have learned recently that wasps can actually cause arthritis.  So, it is a very thin path that I walk in dealing with these menaces.

         As you might imagine, I have become a known persona at the local emergency room.  “Hey there, Estes.  What bit you this time?  Another wasp?"  they laugh as they scramble for the adrenalin.  The doctor will be called after I get the shot.  They have standing orders to immediately inject me with the adrenalin if I am there for a wasp sting.

         So, you can have spring right back, thank you very much.  I’ll wait for summer when it will be too scorching to be outside and I will be forced to wallow around under the soothing, frigid air conditioner and stuff my mouth with yummy Triple Chocolate Cake, gooey homemade caramel, and fresh strawberry shortcake served with vanilla ice cream straight out of the churn, of course. 

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