It’s an early spring ritual, finally sorting through the box of seeds that arrived a month ago, picking out the packets of onions, the celery, and the leeks, the ones that need an early start.

Seed-planting day is a marker of sorts, the beginning of the new season and all that spring embodies, but this year it’s a darker symbol. On the other side of the world a country is methodically and purposely being destroyed, villages, towns, cities leveled. All the packets of seeds, somebody’s dreams of this year’s garden, incinerated. Gardens that won’t be planted, dreams that won’t be realized.

The abruptness of the invasion of Ukraine has been stunning. One day people are cooking in their own kitchens, riding the subway to work, their children are at school and the next day it’s all taken away.

We watched the horror of this brand-new war via a spotty internet connection in Florida, juggling hot spots on our phones and getting some images on iPads, but back home now and turning on the TV has made it more real.

I can feel the weight of a toddler in the arms of those mothers struggling to evacuate, afraid to set their precious child down even for a moment. And the old ones, frail to begin with, maybe confused, out in the cold, leaving behind a lifetime of memories. The awful image of the woman, wounded on a stretcher and apparently in labor.

Lovers, partners, spouses, siblings, parents parting, knowing they may never meet again. As if the Holocaust is being re-run all over again.

As a war-baby myself (no, not a refugee or victim of war, just one born during one) I’ve been steeped in World War II lore, grew up staring at photos of skeletal concentration camp victims, absorbed stories of the London blitz, D Day, Iwo Jima, Ann Frank, Sophie’s Choice, Casablanca, John Hersey’s Hiroshima.

Even back to World War I. The mud in the trenches (my high school history teacher never let us forget: “in mud up to my hips” he’d tell us in his old man-gravely voice), the poets tragically lost in that war, the lungs of John O’Brien – Wally’s purported father – burned out by the mustard gas in the trenches of France. And the truncated life of his actual father, Wallace Case, sent off to the “war to end all wars” at the age of 17.

But there’s a specter to this war that I can’t shake. The racism. Our hearts are touched by the exodus of the now 2.5 million refugees in a way that we don’t seem to feel for the Africans who try to navigate the Mediterranean in unsafe boats, for the Central Americans who trudge across thousands of miles to the hoped-for safety of our border, for the Syrians and Yemenis pounded down by their own wars.

The Ukranians look like us. They’re fair-skinned; they live in the ways we do, in modern apartments and houses, drive nice cars, appear prosperous. We can relate.

But Africans? Middle Easterners? Central Americans? Brown and black people? Not so much. Certainly not the poor of those regions, the people we see fleeing as refugees, carrying their children in their arms. Letting them linger for months and years in foreign lands, in crowded camps, taking our time getting around to “immigration reform”.

What does it say about us, those of us who are of European descent? With that fair skin?

And one more thing that I can’t get out of my head. The wars of invasion that our own country waged, and under the same kind of bogus rationale that Putin has used. Vietnam where we were supposedly keeping the domino of another country from falling to communism. The highly questionable Gulf of Tonkin incident pushed us deeper and deeper into that war. Did we learn anything from that?

Hardly, for a mere 30 years later, in apparent response to the 9/11 attacks we invaded Iraq using “intelligence” about weapons of mass destruction that it turns out didn’t exist. An invasion into a sovereign country that wasn’t even where the 9/11 attackers began. Isn’t that what Putin’s doing?

And those wars didn’t end until we’d leveled much of those countries, lost countless lives, our own and theirs, and ruined how many others.

What is it about killing people that our species seems to relish?

Back Home Again

Three weeks in Florida, where the temperatures hovered between 75 and 81 for most of the time, where a cooling breeze could be counted on every afternoon, where the only decision to be made was “do we cook dinner or eat out?” sounds about perfect. Especially perfect at the end of February and into March when back home it snowed and blew and froze pretty much every day.

But a few weeks away is all it takes. Especially when it’s time to set out the little trays of damp soil for next year’s vegetables. Amazing that those tiny onion seeds, looking like bits of charcoal, will grow into big, plump yellow and red onions that I can tie up in strings and hang in the pantry.

And to watch yet another Pinewood Derby with an O’Brien boy. And to wish Happy Birthday to a little girl turning four this week. And to hug my dog, walk the Ducktrap Road, scatter the hens off their nests, and jump back into the renovation of both the Beach Schoolhouse and the Historical Society’s collection.

Life is so rich.

So that’s what I’m trying to focus on. There’s no fixing the world, only our own little corner, this 39 square mile patch of forest and hills, ponds and streams, and homes of friends and neighbors, and fellow townspeople yet to meet.

School

Excerpts from the March 7 school committee meeting:

“The last day of school will be Thursday, June 23, unless our final allotted snow day is not used; if March blows through without a snow day, the last day at LCS will be Wednesday, June 22. Juneteenth (June 19th) will be a school holiday celebrated as a day off on Monday, June 20th. The 22-23 school calendar was also approved.

“Professional development for staff is ongoing with the collaboration of all Union 69 teachers focusing on highly effective teaching practices and behavior management. Comprehensive Family Life Education will be piloted for grades 7 and 8 this spring with prior parental approval; the goal will be to approve a curriculum for next year.

“LCS became mask-optional as of Monday; on the near horizon are drama club, spring sports (baseball and softball) and middle school dances. …”

Check out the Lynx for information on registering for Little League and Softball for 5-12 year olds.

I’ve thought of Jeannie Hall whenever I’m going past the school towards the town office, wondering how she’s doing. She passed away in late February at the age of 98.

In Person at Last

United Christian Church, which has held Zoom church throughout the winter, will be back inside and together starting next Sunday, March 20. Worship starts at 9:30 a.m.; there will still be an online option, a great way for those away for the winter or wary of Covid  so “come to church”.