Woke up this morning at 7:22 but of course it’s the first Monday under Daylight Savings Time so it was really only 6:22, which is the time I normally wake up.

Drat! Now I can’t take my morning walk!

I hate Daylight Savings Time! I’m a morning person. My finest hour is taken away and handed over to the slugabeds of the country, and I don’t appreciate it. But…what can you do? (Besides move to Arizona)

I decide to the take the walk anyway.

When Jerry walks with me we go around the perimeter of the Ranch, which is two miles exactly. But we frequently encounter big wild pigs, and I feel safe with Jerry because, as he says, he’ll protect me by grabbing me and holding me securely between him and the pigs.

So without Jerry I walk the Village Road, which is 1/3 of a mile long. Six laps—two this way, two that way, two more this way. Two miles.

Abi, our little Maltipoo, bravely makes the first round, but on the second defects to Teresa House, where Sandy spoils her outrageously.

I venture on alone. At Gabriel House Mike wanders out onto the porch looking sleepy. We say good morning. I ask if he’s had his coffee this morning. Not yet.

The eastern sky is reddening now. A huge flock of grackles flies overhead nattering and chattering away. I inspect a cedar elm and see tiny leaves starting to appear. At last! It seemed like spring would never come!

My fourth turn around the road I catch a sharp whiff of wild plum, rising up from the pecan bottoms where they flourish. I’ll ask John to take the nature class and go tag them while they’re still in bloom so we can find them later and maybe beat out the forest critters this year and harvest some for jelly.

By now the PUSH guys, sore and sunburned from their first full day of work yesterday, are filtering out to their work sites. The air is still crisp and cool, and the zing! of hammers hitting wood is beginning to sing out. (I wonder what the PUSH guys think of our COM volunteers,  whose age probably averages 70, who do this work all the time and can work the britches off about anybody.)

I stop by my favorite red ant bed, but they’re not up and about yet, so I come on back to Benedict House. The Carolina jasmine has completely outdone itself with blooms, so I take one last picture, slough off my sneakers, set up the coffee, and start the day.

Oh, how I do love spring!

BIG pig photo courtesy of Google Images