Saturday Photo: Scilla in Chicago and Signs of Spring in Montreal

This was taken just a year ago in Garfield Park in Chicago when the lawns were awash in blue scilla flowers. It'll be another couple of weeks before the lovely little flowers bloom in our front yard, although the snowdrops have been up for a week. The snow banks remain, and wet snow is forecast for late this afternoon. Quebec City is supposed to get another six inches.

But where the snow has melted I raked up leaves yesterday. Last fall I had intended to rake once more, but the first snows of November came and stayed. The leaves underneath are squished up and appear on the way to become good mulch, but since the maples have been infested with tar sport the last couple of years, perhaps cleaning up before the fungus can start propogating this spring will make protect the trees somewhat.

BTW, I spent a good quarter of an hour searching for a connection between the lovely blue flower and the monster Scylla who with Charybides guarded straits through which Ulysses had to pass. There is a link: Scylla (or Skylla) originally was a river goddess who protected the earth and green things in Etruscan mythyology but was morphed into a sea monster by the Greeks and Romans. But the transfer is a reminder of how one group's protector can be another group's ogre. That, however, is too dismal a thought at a time when we are searching for signs of spring.

How about these? I saw my first flock of geese this spring, honking their way north yesterday morning, and this morning at least a half dozen robins were out.