03.31.15  The month is over and has ended so quietly.  On the dock yesterday morning, all I heard were robins back up in the woods and a few chortles from the pair of geese nesting to the south of us.  We’ve been listening for the loons.  I still can’t see buds on the Paper Birch tree by the water, but there is forsythia in town, tulips are about to open, and Rita said her magnolia was sure to bloom by the end of the day.  Finally, on my walk in town yesterday, I spotted buttercups on a hillside.  A scout from the Barn Swallow family has been checking things out for a nest on the porch and then soaring high on the thermals in the afternoon sky.  Once they all arrive, frenetic energy surrounds the house as they dive low and soar high, making a continuous high-pitched screech sound.   We, and the cats, are relieved when their mating season is over, eggs are laid, and calm is restored.

A cold front is due in tomorrow, bringing rain, freezing temperatures, and, in celebration of April Fool’s Day, “graupel”–which I had to look up–defined as snow pellets.  A high wind warning on the lake is forecasted later today as the front moves in from the west.  We grumble, of course, but I try to remember Pema Chadron:  “You are the sky.  Everything else–it’s just the weather.