Monday, March 15, 2010

Spring Snow


We left the palm trees and hot sunshine of Tucson and came home to a wet Spring snowstorm.

We didn't hit snow until north of Albuquerque, but then it hit us with a vengeance, making us crawl home. Someone in Santa Fe tweeted that it had been tea on the patio sunny, then a rainstorm, then all the snow. The forecasters had said snow after midnight, but this hit well before sunset.

Springtime in the Rockies!

The Spring storms are hard on the wildlife, too. A little bird, who had clearly gotten far too wet, pressed up on our threshold, savoring the warmth from our glass door. David captured it and we put it in a box last night to warm up. Now that the sun is warming and the snow shriveling before it, I set it loose to join its brethren at the seed-fest out front.

It looks rumpled enough that I can tell it from the others, but it should be okay.

Yesterday, before we hit the road, we stopped at Starbucks for breakfast. In Tucson there are these roving packs of bikers. The bicycle kind, not the motorcycle kind. They wear matching outfits, with the tight shorts, windbreakers and helmets. They zoom about the city in fleet groups and stop at Starbucks to sit in the sun and treat themselves.

There were several ladies of this ilk waiting for their lattes as we were, of that indistinguishable badly preserved 50s/well preserved 60s age. A very young girl also waited. She was maybe 18. I would have guessed younger, but she wore a short black satin skirt, a black satin top with big rhinestones and very high heels. Heading to a job at a nearby casino perhaps. Not your usual Sunday-morning garb. She looked gorgeous, with the long slim legs only teenage girls seem to have. Her pretty face smiled sweet and open.

The women glared at her and I saw her physically flinch and look away, some of her happiness dimmed. I wondered if she even understood what their problem was. She didn't seem to notice the weathered columns of their thighs, pressed into wrinkles by the tight Lycra. I wanted to tell the ladies to stuff their nasty looks, to give the girl a break.

Let her enjoy her Spring, I wanted to say. There's plenty of Winter to go around. We should celebrate the sunshine wherever we find it.

5 comments:

  1. Love the pictures of the snow and the scene at Starbucks. The funny part is, you know the harridans ogle beauty rendered in oils or pixels. Too bad envy blinded the biddy bike pack to the allure of real life.

    Course, I prolly would've made some snarky comment just a wee bit too loud and ended up wearing the lattes.

    --Recluse for a Reason

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  2. It's too bad you *weren't* there -- we totally could have taken those biddies!

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  3. Ah, that's sad. Human and understandable on a certain level, I guess, but very sad that we should feel envious of the young and beautiful just because we no longer are.

    I hope the girl forgot all about the unhappy bikers within a few minutes.

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  4. This post reminded me of my trip to vegas a couple of weeks ago. When the pilot (who was the nicest, most talkative pilot I've ever had the pleasure of flying with) pointed out that we were flying over various parts of New Mexico. So the first thing that pops in my mind is "Oh, that's where Jeffe lives". So I look out the window and all I see is white covered flat lands. I was like WTH. I was totally freaked me out because it took me a minute to realize the white stuff was snow-LOL

    Yes, I was in extreme need of a vacay at the time. Hence the trip to Vegas :-)

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  5. LT - you are too funny! AND you've been in the South way too long...

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