Spring

Mark Twain once said, "The coldest winter I've experienced was a summer spent in San Francisco."

Mark should have spent a spring in Northwest Kansas.

Monday was a beautiful day. No breeze at all, and warm...Almost hot. Beautiful day that begged you to stay outside.

Today, Friday, the wind is blowing. And not a gentle breeze, but 40 mph winds with gusts up to 60 mph. And, it's raining--with a slight mixture of snow. Rain, which is moving at 40 mph horizontally hurts when is slaps you up-side the head. It pounds into your chest like bullets. You can hear each drop as it smacks into your body and anywhere else it hits.

If it's not raining, then being out in winds like this, requires your full concentration on standing up, on moving forward, on maintaining your balance. And, if it's dry, you have to concentrate on seeing where you want to go. If it's dry, there's so much dust in the air that at times, that you simply cannot see where you are going. That is very scary.

Two weeks ago, on the first day of spring, we had a blizzard. Nasty blizzard. The kids and I were home for Spring Break, but Kev was supposed to work. He chose to stay at home. Visibility was extremely low and the drifting across the highways made driving unsafe. The irony is that not one ounce of snow fell all winter. We had snow in the late fall, but once it was officially winter, no moisture until the first day of spring. Typical weather in Kansas.

Spring also brings track season and baseball season. Today is a perfectly typical track meet day. Miserable, wet, cold and windy. Baseball games get cancelled due to high winds and rain. Track meets do not.

I'd venture to bet that Mark Twain's summer in San Francisco was much nicer than spring in Northwest Kansas.