Whispering spring

 Hey, I can read a calendar. I know where I live, too.

The calendar says it's February 13.

And I live in northern Indiana, where the weather is always on the "Hey, ya'll! Watch this!" setting.

So I know just because we brushed elbows with 65 degrees the other day, and the mercury's been hanging out in the 40s since, like, forever, it's all a tease. I know this isn't an early spring we're experiencing.

It's Whoopee Cushion Spring, is what it is. Practical Joke Spring. Northern-Indiana-Just-Screwing-With-Us Spring.

But you know what?

The other day, I stepped outside and heard birdsong. And now I'm looking out the window here in the den, and there are birds everywhere, winging through the air, hopping from branch to branch in the big tree out front, strutting around the lawn.

What this tells me is, even if spring is a cruel hoax right now, winter is not going to last forever. It tells me real spring is out there whispering, and we can begin to hear it, faintly. And not just in the twittering of birds who have suddenly reappeared as if by magic.

If I turn my ear to the south, for instance, I can hear it in the blare and rumble of muscled up Detroit and Tokyo metal, gaudy vehicular billboards driven by speed freaks who can't wait to start tearing around 31-degree banking in Daytona, Fla.

If I turn my ear south and west, meanwhile, I can hear the pop of horsehide smacking leather, see acres of green grass laid out in its familiar geometry all across Florida and Arizona.

Which is to say, this is Daytona 500 week.  And we're now within days of pitchers and catchers reporting for spring training beneath the high desert sky and the Florida palms.

Daytona means NASCAR is back and spring training means baseball is back, boys of summer returning to their appointed tasks. Sunday we'll turn on the TV and see the familiar Daytona freight-training, as if it were June or July; not long thereafter, we'll look up at the tube and the Cubs will be playing the White Sox or someone, as if it were high summer and so hot you could fry an egg on your forehead.

They're coming, those days. They are a touchable reality again -- same as they become this time every year, at least for me.

So, yeah, lie to me, February. Juke me like Barry Sanders, giving me a leg and then taking it away. Show me birds on the lawn and jacket weather, and then bring back single digits and wind-whipped snow just to show me winter ain't done with me yet.

I don't care. Because you know what?

The leadfoots are filling the air with their sound again. The bats and gloves are coming out of storage, accompanied by the smell of growing things and all that alphabet soup baseball talk, RBI and WAR and RISP  'n' them.

You do you, Whoopee Cushion Spring. Me?

Shoot. I'm crankin' down the car window, and crankin' up the tunes.