Sublime March
E&G | Issue 316
Stepping outside one night, I watched the mist rise from the nearly two feet of snow that lay on our lawn that we have never seen. “Dead souls rising” I said to Thomas, inhaling the warming misty air. This has happened every winter, a time when we return closer to the sun here and feel the warmth but the earth doesn’t yet know what to do with it so it smokes, steams, and vaporizes into chilled air. Next comes the mud, then that unpermitted outdoor burning smell, then the peepers. But that moment when the earth releases the dead from the grips of winter is something…sublime.
“Subligation” Thomas said to me this morning on our way to Tatami in East Bridgewater to have Dim Sum. If you haven’t patronized this local gem yet, you need to if not for Dim Sum then for sushi. It’s phenomenal and let’s just say the south shore needs more of that happening here. “I think that’s what happens when something like snow skips the melting and goes directly into the vapor stage.” Me, being the linguist, doubted if subligation was a word. A car honked at us at a light that had turned green just as I was admiring the thick layer of fog suspended over the old corn fields adjacent to Cumberland Farms. I hate car horns, they’re so rude. ChatGPT quickly told us that the proper term was “sublimation” and we proceeded through the intersection as slowly as we could. Don’t beep at me. You have been warned.
I needed to know more. What did this word mean? What was its etymology?What the hell did it have to do with fog rising from snow? “Dead souls rising.” I said again. The ghosts of many corn stalks past eerily floated by our windshield. The dumplings and shumai at Tatami were paired with hot sake and tea, the exact cure for a slow Sunday morning. We talked about everything at that restaurant last weekend, including the hard stuff. Something about aged soy sauce and black vinegar inspires you to talk and share truth. Or maybe it was the mai tai. Or both. It was one of those perfect weekends and I didn’t want it to end.
“Uh, guys, there’s water coming out of a pipe downstairs and everything’s wet.” It was 4 in the morning on a Monday and J.D. had been awoken in his basement bedroom to the sound of water flowing. “GETABUCKET!!!!” I said as I inspected the plumbing, praying to god that it contained no shit. My 5 foot frame fit nicely under the pipe to catch water as I shouted more orders “TURNTHEWATEROFF!!!” With that, the water stopped flowing but not before a good amount had fallen onto our floors. Suddenly all my philosophical musings about sublimation were rendered null and void. Without missing a beat after shutting down the water, I put in for a day out, and went about contacting our plumber. Oh and we needed someone to fix our fridge because that had died during the weekend too. Don’t buy LGs, they are known to lose their ability to refrigerate themselves, much like a menopausal woman. My next order of business was to order sage smudge sticks because I was convinced the ground and house needed helped releasing those souls. “Welcome to your new home!” Carol at the water department said when I told her of our water debacle.
As I watched the smoke from the sage stick rise up into all of the corners of the house, I asked those dead souls that had risen to keep going. I don’t believe in much but I do believe in energy. A New England March is predictable—it will bring cold, wet, warmth, wind and fire. People start to emerge from their homes and walk their yards again, the first peepers dare to make their desires known to the world. The souls rise, pushing through the saturated earth, and we New Englanders usher them up to allow the warmth to take hold again. We need this time of year, we crave everything about it. Though the month of March is seemingly interminable and brings its own share of maladies that will surely rock our worlds, it also cracks open that door to what is to come. Though the ground may weep directly into your home and refrigerators may die thus forcing you to shove every last condiment and shrapnel of cheese remaining into chunks of snow to keep our daily bread from spoiling, it isn’t a month to be wished away. It is, instead, a time to cherish the icy rain because it permits another fire in your hearth, to anticipate small arrivals like crocuses and the songs of newborn frogs, to watch as silver maples dare to push their burgundy buds out of their weather-beaten branches, and to pair hot soup dumplings with a sake just as hot. I used to hate March but failed to recognize it for what it truly is….sublime.