sandals

Running errands in my neighbourhood today I noticed a LOT of people out walking in sandals. Yes, sandals. Flip-flops, even. I think it was only about five degrees this morning, but it's true that it wasn't raining for a change. One woman I noticed, out walking her dog, was not only wearing sandals, but she had a kind of crazed look in her eyes. I couldn't quite place the look at first. And then the light went on: It's the look of spring. In Vancouver it's the look that comes over the faces of the folk who've suffered the most in the seemingly non-stop, daily rainfall-warning déluge of this time of year. In the moment I placed the look, I got the most vivid flashback from my childhood...

I remembered the ill-defined but definite ecstacy that would surge to the surface on the first day that it looked like winter was over. The temperature might have been only barely above zero, but if the snow was melting and the sun was shining, it was time to pull out a spring jacket and a skipping rope and play outside. No more winter games, it was time for the stuff of summer: skipping, hide and seek, hopscotch. We'd play until our hands froze, and then play a little longer in blissful denial. Sometimes the spring craze would hit so strongly that we'd go down to the river to put our bare feet in the water-- even when ice floes were still making their way down the St. Lawrence. We'd count to see how long we could leave our feet in the water before the pain got too overwhelming. Sometimes our feet turned blue.

This flashback was so vivid that I could practically smell the the residue of a full winter's sand and salt on the asphalt, and the new rubber smell of that year's skipping rope, and the ice water on my feet. There was time enough to offer this memory in the substance of a smile to the sandalled woman and her dog, now crossing my path. "Isn't it a glorious day?" she said, in response to my silent declaration. The crazed look piqued a little bit more in her eyes, perhaps because she knew I'd recognized its source? "Yes!" I replied, "And I can see you're enjoying it very much!" As was I. As was I.