There’s got to be a story behind the handful of doritos, plastic fork, baseball helmet, and pair of sneakers that appeared in the front yard yesterday.

I’d also like to know what’s happened to my neighbor, who keeps getting memos from the main office, but who hasn’t seemed to be living here for the last month and a half.

I always soak new heads of lettuce for several minutes before drying them and ziplocking them into bags for the refrigerator. (Not only does it lift nasty bacteria well, but the lettuce can keep for twice as long without going brown and wilty.) Today was a new experience for me, though.

I went to retrieve my lettuce from its bath only to find hundreds of little bugs floating in the water and clinging to the leaves. I’m not used to so much protein crawling around in my lettuce.

Day after day, blue skies and light breezes encourage lunches under the pine trees, after-work walks, and lazy evenings on the porch. The weather is perfect.

Unfortunately, while it’s not too good to be true, but it is too good to be good. Lurking behind these beautiful days is the drought that’s making all the clear skies possible. It’s the driest spring since the Dust Bowl, apparently, and the 3rd driest spring on record.

Even knowing this, though, I’m unable to entirely begrudge the perfection. I’m glad to be able to sit one my porch in the evenings, snuggled in a warm wrap, with a book and a laptop in easy reach.

I wish the things I want and enjoy weren’t so often both good and unfortunate, or good and impossible.

… when “trillion” was an impossibly huge number that never came up in real conversation. Or newscasts.

… when “mid- to upper-30s” came with modifiers like “mild” or even “warm” in weather forecasts rather than “nippy.”

… when the idea of eating lunch outside seemed so remote as to be fictional.

… when I could walk farther than a mile without wilting.

… when I thought the worst that would likely happen to my job was a salary freeze. (The worst that could happen is another story entirely, but that’s not likely, so I won’t entertain those thoughts yet.)

… when getting into the car meant getting into something that was colder than you left it rather than warmer.

… when the phrase “back of the brain” didn’t seem so disorienting.

… when hearing the phrase “TEA parties” sounded like something that could be defined as “having parties involving the drinking of tea, the eating of crumpets, and light conversation.”

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What a difference a short period of time makes.

Also, clearly much of what’s happened in my life recently is spring-related. And that’s a good thing.