The idea that a “robin red-breast” as the first sign that spring is here seems sort of weird. I grew up with that little “rule” and for years, it was in my head. After all, the robin is the state bird of Connecticut – so I guess when it comes back from Miami, that’s pretty official, at least for New England. But then I moved to Seattle and while yeah, they’re here, there seem to be other “signs of spring” that are far more reliable.

In recent years, I’ve learned to use two occurrences to prove that spring is just about here, well, three if you count the crocuses but that’s sort of cheating. Their whole JOB is about being early flowers to remind you that yes yes winter WILL END some day (I planted some years ago for just that reason, because winter was like 10 months long and taking forever to go away.)

But the two surest signs that spring has come to Seattle are a) someone washing a car outside in the street (preferably wearing shorts and a tee shirt, even if it’s 47 degrees out) and/or b) the first yard/garage sale of the season (probably set up by people in shorts/tee shirts, in 47 degree weather, etc.)

Oh yeah, or the UPS/mail carrier person is in shorts (as the UPS guy was today. After I saw the robin.)

Shorts, as Stu and I have learned, come out of the Seattle closet the minute the risk of frost is gone. We almost, I should note, NEVER get frost at our elevation; cities north of us can, but when I used to garden, for example, I never had to worry about digging up stuff because the frost would likely kill it.

But seriously, with the damn crows and grackles and whatever those big loud annoying things are in my neighborhood, hurray for that robin that I saw as I headed home from the store today! It’s only like 43 degrees right now, so it’s a little hard to buy the whole “spring” thing even if yes, there were crocuseses, croci, crocusim, out at least a week or two ago and daffodils visible.

We used to be able to measure summer’s true appearance by the first time “Joe” drove past. “Joe” was the guy with the little ice cream truck who made Stu and me pretty hysterical every damn time he came to the neighborhood. If you, as I did, grew up with the “Good Humor” truck driving the streets of your little urban neighborhood, you know how s-l-o-w-l-y those trucks go; driving slowly enough for the kids to hear the bells or music, go whine to their parents for money, run outside, get called BACK into the house to put shoes on, and run outside again to get a fudgicle. Or, if you were in MY neighborhood, you not only got the Good Humor man (always a man) you also got the local dude who sold all sorts of other “novelties” (I have no memory of what he was called or what he sold other than what we called “lemonice”, all one word, but oh gods on hot 92 degree Connecticut summer days, that stuff was ambrosia. TRUE HEAVEN was the Mr. Softee truck, the guy who sold the soft ice cream that I still adore more than anything. Mr. Softee still exists – though not here in Seattle – he’s an eastern regional phenomenon.

But here Joe, who was one of 5 or 6 Joes apparently, as I recall from a newspaper article, NEVER ONCE drove slowly enough for me to get out of the house in time. I move slowly, yeah, it’s true, but even before the cane, I’d hear the jingle of the bells and head out to buy an ice cream treat, what the heck. And he was gone, poof. Joe drove SO FAST, that it was a regular joke chez Roscoe. We saw him getting home at night and his wife would say “So how’d it go?” and Joe, who was busy bringing in all the boxes of unsold popsicles and ice cream sandwiches would just look baffled and say “I dunno, honey. I guess kids just don’t eat ice cream any more. I drove all over north Seattle, I saw tricycles and I went past the Boys & Girls Clubs and everything and no one every waved me down to buy something.” No, we were half a block up the street yelling “JOE! COME BACK! I WANT A FUDGIE BAR!”

Sad to say, the Good Humor guys no longer cruise the neighborhoods. In fact, I just went to look and the Good Humor TRUCKS are no longer part of the GH ice cream company now owned by huge corporate thingy Unilever (who make soap) (eu) but this makes me all the MORE appreciative of the truck that Cornelia and I encountered outside the damn Chicago Bouchercon hotel. And where I got a Chocolate Éclair or a Toasted Almond for old times sake. I can’t recall – my sister preferred the latter and I might have had one of those. Jeeeze it was bad – I’m so used to better non-chemical tasting Ben & Jerry’s now.

As I was pondering the new/traditional signs idea, I dug out this old anniversary greeting card I had. I used to buy greeting cards a lot and save them for the right event. I never sent this one – it’s a Sandra Boynton card listing “traditional anniversary gifts” and it just cracks me up. It’s MANY years old – 20 I think all those copyright Xs mean – so many new products aren’t listed but I do admit to loving some of her choices for anniversary gifts. There’s no rhyme nor reason for most, at least that I can tell but here are a few,for example:

Thirteenth – Beef By-products
Fourteenth – Jell-O
Nineteenth – Petroleum Derivatives
Twenty-Third - Aquatic pets
Twenty-seventh – homeopathic ointments
Thirty-fourth – flash-frozen fish
Forty-fourth – room dividers
Forty-eighth – winsome figurines

And of course
Hundredth – CHOCOLATE (possibly in the form of a fudgicle, but only if you can catch the guy with the truck)