More green in March than just St. Paddy's Day

The Whitehouse family arrived in Corning on February 28th, 1984. It was snowing, gloomy and gray. As Dolly from Family Circus put it, there was "not a sky in the cloud". And not a sign of green anywhere.

However, then, as now, spring was springing.

One of the great joys of March is to rake mulch off the flower beds and to expose the little clumps of snowdrops nodding at the warming soil. Perhaps the yellow of a primrose waiting to burst out of its sheath of green. Winter aconites, also nodding, but not for long. Soon they will turn their brilliant yellow faces to the sun.

And the daffodils! Still not much more than an inch above the soil, but rich with the promise of more glorious yellow.

This year I also found 3 newspapers from January and the one I couldn't locate yesterday. It is often a challenge as I gather the delivery person flings them out the window of a vehicle. Except on Sundays. (S)he doesn't seem to like working on the sabbath, so I get two papers on Monday. I can sort of understand all that. What I can't understand is how an unused ink cartridge got under the leaves. Not one for a printer, you understand, but for my small collection of fountain pens. I can't compete with my erudite friends, two of whom have vast collections of fountain pens. But my collection is growing, and growing is really important, especially in the garden.