Signs of spring 2

March snowfall: 92 inches
Season to date: 244.6

Today has been a day of weather contrasts. Sunny with fingers of warmth reaching through the air one minute, then snowing the next. It was perfect, really ... enough sunlight to perk up the sullen mood that comes from not enough sleep, but snowy enough to absolve any guilt about spending too much of the day inside.

Spring seems to be on everyone's mind. I think it's because the first signs of the season are starting to break through. Evidence of early spring in Alaska is very subtle ... even imaginary, in some cases. A sprout here, a non-raven bird there. Spring likes to keep a low profile here until it's suddenly summer, so, in the meantime, we cling to whatever clues we can find.

I remember last year, those subtle moments in which I first started to get a sense that the cold and snow would in fact not last forever. So I scrolled back, and found that the first concrete images of spring 2006 also appeared on March 26. Since this seems to be an anniversary of some sort, I thought I'd look for some Signs of Spring: 2007.

Something green punching through the snow: Actually, quite a bit of snow has melted since I first saw these spiny leaves poking out of several inches of icy crust. I'm not even sure what kind of plant this is, but it's about as impatient as plants come. Twenty bucks says the rest of the city's greenery doesn't show its face until May.

Midnight out at noon: I'm beginning to realize that my cats may actually make through the winter without killing each other. Too much time indoors makes for some spastic felines, but it's been almost impossible to coax them out during the day for months. Now they're raring to go out. They've even found places cleared enough of snow to soak up some sunlight. Good sign.


So much daylight: It's been strange to come home for my dinner break when it's still light out. I walk across the deck and notice that what I see is buildings and mountains, not blurs of orange light shrouded in fog. Pretty soon, it there will be daylight when I come home from work at 11 p.m. Strange.

Landlords still haven't taken the Christmas lights down: Back in January, Geoff and I laughed about this. In February, our neighbors laughed about it. Now it seems to be an unspoken oddity, like having 15 cats - humorous, but with a hint of sad desperation. But Christams lights are so out of place, they're a constant reminder of the passing of time.

Healing up nicely: So last year on March 26, I rear-ended Geoff on a road bike and body-slammed the snowless pavement at 15 mph. The crash ripped away a respectable chunk of my left knee. It took me a while to grow it back, and I didn't do a very good job of it, judging by the unsightly purple scar tissue that remains. Coincidentally, I was sitting at the edge of the public pool today when a lady from my normal gym swam up. She stopped to take a drink of water and regarded me for several seconds before she recognized me. (I think the wet hair and relative lack of clothing threw her off.) We've exchanged injury war stories in the past, and since my knees were right at her eye level, we only got our hellos in before she loudly asked "Oh no! Did you have to get surgery?"

I scrunched my forehead in confusion for a split second before I realized what she was talking about. "Oh no, no," I laughed. "That's my good knee."

Cabin fever

I don't have any pictures today because I haven't been outside for a couple of days. Patience has never been a virtue of mine. And with work as busy as its been, and the rest of life as enclosed as it's becoming, I'm about ready to burst out the door in a fight-or-flight sprint from apathy.

I can't shake the feeling that if this were the era of survival-of-the-fittest, I would have already been culled from the herd. It's funny to think about life in the caveman days, wondering what would finally bring you down. Some would die in a vicious battle with a potential meal. Others would die in an arduous journey, or by accident when trying to impress a potential mate while jumping over fire. I would be the one to contract a minor injury and become the slowest in the pack by just a touch - but just enough - to fall behind when the predators came around.

I've done some more swimming in the past two days. My hair is like straw and I've been fending off a cramp in my calf muscle most likely caused by dehydration, but other than that, it's going really well. Today I swam 100 laps. It gave me some time to think about endurance swimming as a pursuit. If I learned some technique, worked on moving faster, figured out how to stick my face in the water without inhaling, and bought a good swim cap, I could see progression in this sort of a thing. Of course, swimming long distances in a pool is about as interesting as running 3,100 miles around a single city block. And if I wanted to do something fun, like, say, swim across Kachemak Bay or the English Channel, I'd have to become a lot less intensely afraid of moving water (deep water doesn't scare me. Waves and rivers do.) Other than that, to be quite honest, I think I have more inherent aptitude for swimming than any other sport I've ever tried. Strange to be so naturally inclined and yet so terrified of something at the same time.

Not that I want to be a swim dork or anything. This blog will go bicycle again. Promise.

More avalanche photos

Sorry. I came across some photos of the recent avalanche in action, and I just had to post them for posterity. I'm actually not sure who took these photos or where they came from. They are one of those things that have been circulating in mass e-mails around town. And we identify with them and pass them on to our friends because we *almost* share a common experience.

Tonight I went with friends to see The Who's "Tommy" at the Perseverance Theatre. We were under the impression that we were going to see a local production in a small-town theater in Douglas, so we showed up thinking we'd just be able to buy tickets. They looked at us like we had twirled in wearing bed sheets and begging for free seats, but they did offer to herd us into a corner and sell us a seat if something opened up. It seemed unlikely that they'd have five extra tickets, but we persevered and they managed to wedge us into the last five seats available, even vaguely within sight of each other.

The play gave me an idea to create a rock opera about ice biking in the Arctic. In order to sell it to the masses, there would have to be at least one contrived love story about a cyclist who loses his way in a roiling storm, only be rescued by a beautiful Inuit girl who he then loses track of in another roiling storm. Then there'd be an encounter with a wayward polar bear, a harrowing ascent of some gnarly pass, a self-revealing moment of clarity beneath the northern lights, yet another roiling storm, and then a happy reunion. I can't decide what kind of rock would narrate the story best. I was thinking maybe Pearl Jam. Or Jimmy Eat World.

Um ... yeah. Anyway, hope you enjoyed the avalanche photos.