This year the winter has been rough with snow and ice still piled high along the roadways like small mountains, and just try to find a park bench to sit on. The alternate side of the street parking regulations has been reinstated so that the standing snow and ice can be scrapped away to allow for more cars to park. And though thankfully the sun was out today, the air is still quite chilly and nothing is melting very fast.
So, I decided to head over to the New York Botanical Garden and to hang out for a while at the Enid A. Haupt Conservatory. What a great decision that turned out to be. The sun was bright, the sky a brilliant blue and though it was still very cold outside once I walked into the conservatory the air felt so warm I could have believed that I’d arrived in the Bahamas. There were no ocean breezes, no sound of waves slapping against a sandy beach, but it was warm, humid and because it was an early Friday afternoon, I nearly had the place to myself.
There were not a lot of flowers in bloom but there were some tropical beauties on display. What a wonderfully welcomed sight they were with the bright reds, subtle pastel shades of orchids and a few exotic, waxy flowers that dangled over the pathway in the rainforest section.
In another month the Botanical Garden will have its annual Orchid show. I’m really looking forward to that and I know then that Spring is really nearly here. I have already marked it in my calendar.
There’s still a lot of snow on some streets, especially in those areas that get very little sunlight and as I park my car on a side street in Brooklyn to pick something up at the drugstore, I can’t help but take a photograph of one of the classic dirty snow piles that still dot our NYC streets.
