Here in Michigan where the coronavirus has a firm grip, the governor has closed businesses deemed inessential. Including garden stores. While I’m as outraged as the next gardener that she doesn’t consider seeds and plants for warm weather crops essential, I, apparently unlike some others, have looked out the window. This is what I see.

Here’s the thing. The average last frost date for Ann Arbor is May 21^st. This means if you put warm weather plants out there on April 15^th they will die. Any time in April that there’s precipitation overnight, there’s a good chance it will be snow. I even have photographic proof: snow on my daffodils, and the fact that snow does not bother my daffodils. They expect it. People ought to, but they say things like, “Late Season Storm Barreling Down,” instead of  “Still Cold In Michigan But You Knew That, It’s Why You’re Not Out There Planting Your Tomatoes.”

Impatience tends to hang in the air as spring advances, and now there’s this virus to be tired of, too. March was 487 days long, and the first half of April went about the same way. But signs that things are creeping toward improvement only make some people even more impatient.

Upstairs in my front window, the tomato seedlings I started weeks ago are staying cozy, unfurling themselves a leaf or two at a time. Change is coming, slowly. When it gets here, my seedlings and I will be ready.