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Show Vjj0 by Nan Chalat Finally something to crow about Our first seed catalog arrived this week, and seeing its bright green cover hanging out of the mailbox was like seeing the light at the end of a cold, dark tunnel. The pages were filled with snap peas, bush beans and June-bearing June-bearing strawberries which stirred fantasies of warm afternoons in the garden. Its arrival couldn't have been more timely. Everyone we know is bone tired of battling winter. At our house the kitchen drain froze, the axe handle broke and the fuel and electric elec-tric bills arrived on the same day. Our spirits were dangerously low. When the plumber finally arrived to look at our ancient an-cient plumbing and asked whether the man who installed it might still be alive, we nearly lost all hope. Sitting down to leaf through pictures of petunias, buttercups and bluebells was a welcome escape. The Gurney's seed catalog was followed by the Smith and Hawken garden tool catalog, and since then our thoughts have turned from endless winter to spring. It may be too early to begin indoor starts but it is not too soon to comtemplate a garden plan and fill out a seed order. Thus we began to pull ourselves up from the icy depths of a January depression and realized that the daylight was lingering a little lit-tle longer, and the starlings in the cotton-wood cotton-wood had thawed out enough to start chirping chir-ping again. Things seemed to be looking up. Our plumbing, by the way, was finally restored by a method befitting its vintage. A welder had stopped by and told us he wouldn't touch our frozen pipes with a ten-foot ten-foot pole, but a young tradesman with a healthy respect for antiques told us to fill the sink with water and rock salt. It worked like a charm. With the domestic scene almost under control con-trol and a slight warming trend filtering into the valley, we decided to venture out for a tour. On Sunday, we set out on a summer highway so entrenched now with snow that the landmarks were barely recognizable., The road signs we followed when the wild-flowers wild-flowers were in bloom last July were buried in the drifts, and the river fork had disappeared disap-peared beneath the snow. The last snowmobilers had just packed up and headed back to the city so we had the road to ourselves. Or so I thought. The dogs ran ahead to scout out the new terrain and we followed at a sedate Sunday pace. The evergreens along the upper ridge leading to the pass were lightly frosted and the steep slopes below were scarred with small snow slides. Here and there an animal trail meandered down to the river, but nothing moved except us. And then I heard a familiar voice. Or I thought I did. The voice reminded me of Southern Utah, of the Grand Canyon, red rocks and desert flowers. Another fantasy? Nope. There he was. A big shiny black crow with an eye out for a possible picnic. He cawed at us and we cawed back. One of the dogs barked and he swooped overhead to take her for a run up the road. She fell for it, later returning with her tongue flapping in the breeze. The crow waited up ahead. When we caught up he chortled and clucked at our slow progress. He flew ahead, flew back, teased the dogs, showed off by diving down to the river bed and returned to preen in a nearby juniper. We were wondering if he would follow us home, but when we turned back he soared on over the pass. By the time we had dinner on the stove at home he was probably halfway to Canyonlands. |
