We had a late snow this week. Television meteorologists had been daring to hint that we might have had an early last snowfall, and then, late in April, along came this winter storm. A couple more inches of snow is no big deal after months of wielding a snow shovel. We didn’t even need to retrieve our shovel from the garage, where it had been tucked away for the season; the snow didn’t stick to the sidewalks.
The big deal of the storm is the temperatures that came with it. We had two nights in a row of sustained hard freezes. Nurseries warned customers to cover tender plantings and to shelter anything not yet planted. We have pots of hellebores waiting in the garage until it’s safe to come out. They’ll be all right. The newly transplanted viburnum will just have to do the best it can.
Michiganders are anxious about more than the plants in their gardens, though. When there’s a late freeze, we worry about the cherry crop. The state is the country’s largest producer of tart cherries, and the fourth-largest producer of sweet cherries. Our biggest crop is apples, but what we always hear about, relative to late freezes, is cherries. Last year, due to freezes, the cherry crop was abysmal. We’re hoping for burgeoning orchards this time around.
The snow began last Monday as a fine, misty drizzle. By dusk, low visibility had shrunk the world. Our maple trees—all that we could see of the back yard by then–looked like part of an antique black-and-white photograph. Only, instead of sepia-tone, the filter was a faint green, maple blossoms sticky with snow. The lawn had the same pale cast, blades of grass covered in tiny, white flakes. The out-of-doors looked charmingly make-believe. We could only wish the sound effects were soft and cocoon-y as well. Instead, the wind blew mightily, rattling windows and doors that had never rattled before.
Tuesday morning was quiet and bright, the sort of morning when you know as soon as you open your eyes that there’s been snow. Snow on the ground muffles sound and reflects light. Eager to see what snow looks like when spring is so far advanced, I looked out front and found the familiar transmogrified: all the trees had become pear trees. Maple, crab, serviceberry, all looked like pear because of the snow wrapping their blossoms. Pear trees themselves looked extra-peary, with blossoms amplified and brightened by the coating of snow. Winter in the late spring turns out to be beautiful, in a surrealist way. Whether the scene leaned more toward Disney or Dali, I couldn’t decide.
The dog didn’t care one way or the other. He has a cheery, it’s-all-good outlook on most weather, so off we went on our morning walk. The sun came out, the temperature rose, and a little breeze came up. Snow began to fall in little puffs from the branches and flowers of trees. Whereas all vegetation had appeared flocked, now anything onto which the snow puffs fell took on that same appearance, including and especially one small dog. A small, flocked, black dog.
He stopped under a pear tree to partake of scents in the snow, and as we stood there, clumps and pieces of whiteness gathered at our feet. Some of it was snow. Some of it was petals. All of it was white and lovely.
We kept walking, and the snow kept melting. Color returned. Redbuds showed an edge of deep pink under the snow, crabtrees a paler pink. Tulips and hyacinths and daffodils gradually returned to their intended hues. In the woods, spring beauty and trout lily and trillium began to open again. The foliage of mayapple, cut-leaved toothwort, false solomon’s seal, and wild geranium came out from under the snow. Bluebells bloomed near the bridge at Thurston Pond.
My friends Sue and Tesla and I explored a city park on Tuesday afternoon, Hunt Park on the northwest side of town, and strolled the surrounding neighborhood. The snow was gone, but Sue and I were bundled against the wintry wind and cold. Tesla wore her usual lush fur. Toward the end of our walk, Sue suggested we check on the vineyard and steered us downhill to a house with a large, sloping yard. That was covered with carefully tended vines trained over row upon row of trellises. What a surprise: a vineyard in southeastern Michigan. The vines looked dormant, so maybe they escaped damage from the late snow.
So all we have to worry about is the cherries.