
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, March 17, 1990                   TAG: 9003222313
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A9   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: MONTY S. LEITCH
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

JUNE OR MARCH?

ALL THIS past week, when it's seemed so much like June, I've been thinking there's something I ought to be doing, even though it's not the right time of year. Finally I realized what's been nagging: I've been thinking I ought to be mowing the yard.

Of course, the grass isn't out enough yet; around here it's not even much green. But still these steamy afternoons, these long evenings when frogs are singing, these nights when it's too hot to sleep unless the bedroom windows are open - they all make me think I ought to be mowing the yard.

Soon enough. I've reminded myself over and over again. And once it gets started again, it'll be relentless for months.

In the meantime, I'm displaced in time.

Monday I thought I heard a neighbor running his mower. This is the neighbor with the best-looking yard around here. He keeps his grass groomed like a carpet. My grounds are always more ragged. I never start caring early enough.

But that insistent whirring out there wasn't merely my lazy, guilt talking. It was a mower. And I know it isn't yet time!

Maybe my neighbor was just firing his mower up. Cleaning out the filters, sharpening up the blades. Maybe he was just driving it around some, getting the feel of it all again. Maybe he was just getting the mower and himself both ready for what this weather's been making us think is just around the corner, even though it isn't. The noise made my poor head spin.

Wednesday the "Road Work Ahead" signs were up along 221 and the parkway. Men were cutting trees. They were mowing! I was driving along with the air conditioner blowing full blast and wishing pantyhose had never been invented. But that's a summer thought. It shouldn't even occur to a person before May 15, at least.

But there it was. Along with this nonsense about mowing.

It's crazy to gripe about weather of any kind. It's crazier still to gripe about weather that's good. But if we don't really have our March, what will we have in April? Won't May be a disappointment? And what if this summer's temperatures set high records every day, too?

This isn't just grouchiness. This is displacement in time.

by CNB