There is something about spring. Seeing the bright green leaves exploding out across the landscape, it makes your heart leap and the blood sing through your body and brings back a youth and vigour, a wanderlust and desire for adventure, long dormant through the long, dark days of winter.
Don’t get me wrong, winter is beautiful, peaceful, and winter sports are some of my very favourite, but getting back outside and smelling the fir forest, walking through the vibrant and living hillsides, full of birds and chattering squirrels is another thing entirely.
Not having to make sure you have enough layers, coverings for hands and feet, emergency fire starter – just in case.
By April, the feeling of waiting for the spring to arrive gets a bit urgent, once the ski hill ends the season and the trails are still covered in snow, then thick with mud.
But it is finally here, the renewal and the thrill of getting the bike out of the shed, dusting it off and getting the heart pumping again.
There are kids riding their bikes in the evenings, the other night some youth were knocking a softball around on Cottonwood Beach, and the bike park is getting used again.
It’s an exciting time, and one when you can, maybe not quite forget, but put the reality of a Harper government valuing fighter jets over parks, elections over honesty in accounting and pipelines over protecting the environment out of mind.
It’s nice to have a distraction.
I only hope we pay enough attention when we need to.
