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Spring Green

Growing up in Southern California, I was often annoyed by the people who griped that “there are no seasons here.” Of course there are seasons, they’re just more subtle than elsewhere. And there are more of them! There’s not just your usual winter, spring, summer, and autumn, but you’ve also got your fog, smog, Santa Ana, and fire micro-seasons.

However, I digress.

There is a color here in Québec that’s extremely rare in Southern California. You may see it covering the hillsides for a week, not long after the first rains. If you hike in the mountains, there’ll be a few days when you’ll see it in the white alders or sycamores along the streams.

But here in Montréal, there’s a gradual unfolding where it starts small, tentatively. There’s a budding, and then leaves emerge, and all the while the color is shifting from the tenderest of yellow-greens into a brighter harlequin. Then, suddenly, the vibrant spring green shows up everywhere, vivid and exuberant.

Spring green. It’s difficult to describe and impossible to really photograph. Wandering among the maples of Mont Royal Park, surrounded by the color, is like witnessing the creation of the world.

By summer time, the colors will harden into a more traditional forest green. The shades will remain cool and soothing, but the overwhelming, electrifying energy will be muted. The leaves will gradually darken into the sedate shades of pine needles and evergreens.

Then, of course, will come the searing flares of autumn, before the leaves fall and the cycle repeats.

One reply on “Spring Green”

I was one of those who think there is no season in So Cal. I wasn’t talking about one Liquid Amber tree on my street for the fall…. I see the subtle changes now, but I do miss the dramatic changes! Those spring green is so fresh!

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