In June, our neighborhood pool opens, and I'm there between five and six p.m. every warm day until it closes just before Labor Day. I wrote the pool check today at my desk while looking out at the piles of snow. After this winter, I can't believe I'll ever be warm enough to don a bathing suit.

I have lived in the Boston area all my life, and until this year, people have not been able to ice fish on the ponds in mid-March, at least not in my lifetime.

The sun has laid the southern slopes bare, and I know the ticks are getting ready to hatch, and the winter hiking is over for another year. Everyday I think, can Sophie and I grab one more hike? With all the Lyme Disease among dogs in our area, I don't want her to get it.

I'm reading Kafka on the Shore (scroll down the link to get to the interview) by Murakami Haruki, and I'm bereft that I have to return it soon. There's a long list of people waiting for it, and I've got to make haste to a bookstore to buy it.