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Yellow SeasonApril 23, 2006 Baby leaves are growing on the twigs and branches outside my office window, filtering my view of the house next door: a two-story reverse saltbox with dark red trim. (Hey, another blessing to count: My workspace has a window! It's even in a corner! If only the IRS would let me call it an office!) The day looks to be about the same color as the weathered shingles on my neighbor's house. (It's 9:30 a.m., but Rhodry isn't up yet so I haven't been out.) Yesterday was about the same, and chilly too. No matter: against the gray and bleak the brilliant yellows are all the more jubilant. Mid-April is yellow season on Martha's Vineyard. First the daffodils and jonquils appear -- the other day while we were riding around the Mai Fane meadow, Allie spooked at new-bloomed jonquils; maybe she recognized magic -- then just as they're reaching their peak the long-subdued forsythia bursts into bloom. Forsythia yellow is so bright you remember the warnings about staring at the sun during a solar eclipse. It whips your head around as you drive down the road. It's so yellow the forsythia flowers can't contain it: it spills into new leaves and spring grass, turning them that delicate, tentative green that darkens as summer approaches and the forsythia fades. Some of the yellow of yellow season is buttercups. Around kindergarten-age I learned that butter was made by stirring. Stirring what? Buttercups seemed the logical thing, so I picked a bunch, put them in a stainless-steel bowl, added water, and started to stir. I stirred and stirred. The flowers stayed flowers and the water stayed clear. It was an early lesson in the trickster quality of the English language. Dandelions are yellow for sure. I'm not a gardener or a lawn-keeper; I have no quarrel with dandelions, I admire their sunny faces and their tenacious roots. I like their grey puffballs too. When I was a kid, Mrs. Shepherd next door was frequently heard cussing out dandelions. When she wasn't looking, I'd blow the puffballs all over her lawn.
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