View from the Cheap Seats is kind of an extension of the newsroom. Whenever our three regular reporters, Calvin Daniels, Thom Barker and Randy Brenzen are in the building together, it is frequently a site of heated debate. This week: What do you like best about spring in Saskatchewan?
Same as other seasons
So, we come to the last of our seasonal Cheap Seats and I will start spring with the same sentiment with which I started summer, fall and winter.
What don’t I love about spring in Saskatchewan?
It comes upon as fast. First, the honking of geese returning from their southern sojourn, then a little bit of warmth that, like magic brings the first fragile sprouts of green from the ground and on the limbs of trees.
Spring is bicycles and shirtsleeves and cricket and baseball and ice cream from Scoops. It is longer days and open windows and relaxing on the deck. It is thunderstorms and barbecues and long comfy walks with the dog.
One of the great things about the four seasons in Saskatchewan is just how much contrast there is between them. It makes life interesting.
I love all the seasons and all they have to offer, but I’m not delusional. There are good things and bad about each of the seasons, but there really is nothing a person can do about the weather. The only thing we have control over is how we react to it and I choose to find the best in it.
-Thom Barker
Dog Days
With the past week being so hot already, my mind’s eye places me in my lush backyard with a thick fantasy novel in front of me, a cold glass of iced tea in my hand and my dog basking happily in the sun beside me. Or maybe I’m looking forward to being out on the lake with my parent-folk, catching Walleye in the middle of a feeding frenzy at dusk. Better yet, cooking said fish over an open fire with my young nephews while they ask me questions about nature. What am I looking forward to? Weekends that I can spend outside with the people (and dogs) I love the most.
Michaela Miller
Celebrate Me
The best thing about May, and about spring as a whole, is that my birthday is in it. Sure, birthdays have not been as exciting as a grown man, but mine is combined with a long weekend and as a result it’s like I get a national holiday all to myself. The holiday is technically Victoria Day, but then again my godmother is technically Victoria, though she goes by Vicky and nothing else. The magic of the weekend is that it’s all about me, whether or not it’s actually about me in the minds of anybody else. It’s a rare gift to have your own holiday weekend, and one that I’m always very enthusiastic about.
The celebration of myself is easily what I look forward to the most, but it’s not the only thing. Flowers are nice, and I’ve always enjoyed spending time in greenhouses in spite of the fact that I don’t actually enjoy gardening. While we are in Saskatchewan and that means the weather is erratic at best – we tend to go from 30 above to a chance of snow with a whiplash-inducing speed – it’s still nice to come out of the cold of winter into the occasional warmth of spring. It’s also nice to actually have sunlight in the evening again after months of early darkness, it makes it worth going outside in the evenings.
But none of that really matters, the most important thing about spring is it is the time of year where I can pretend I get a national holiday.
Devin Wilger
Heading outdoors
Ah yes ’tis the time of May flowers.
All right not many in Saskatchewan perhaps, although it is the time gardeners are perhaps their happiest planting what will become great table fare, or beautiful flower beds.
If you are not a gardener, there is almost no green in my body, let alone a concentration in my thumb, that is all right since May is the time of year when there are just so many compelling things to grab our attention.
I suspect we are so excited by May activities simply because we have just emerged from far too many weeks, weeks which turned to months, of winter. We are simply ready to do anything which does not require a half dozen layers of clothing to be comfortable once we walk out the front door.
So for most of us that means we crave outdoor activities in May.
It’s still a few weeks away from the start of the Western Major Baseball League season, and our local Cardinals hitting the diamond, so the relaxation of watching a game misses this list.
What remains for me are two rather obvious activities.
The Saskatchewan fishing season opens in May, and that means the lure of early season trips to the water.
Some years opening weekend has been a frigid thing, but this year it was near ideal (see a full account in my Fishing Parkland Shorelands in this edition).
And then there is disc golf. I’m an avid disc golfer, and Patrick Park Disc Golf Course is a great place to be in May - well any month practically.
And, the local course is not the only option. There are now nearly 20 courses within 125-kilometres of Yorkton, so road trip possibilities abound.
Several of the courses have fish bearing water close by, so that is a double whammy of May time fun waiting to happen.
Oh, and I will find time to follow the Saskatchewan Rush on their lacrosse playoff run, and the TO Raptors efforts in the NBA. There are occasional nights a seat on the couch is just right too.
- Calvin Daniels
