Spring was a long time coming this year, especially considering the epic snowfall and deep freeze we had to deal with. As a Floridian, naturally, I have not been amused.

It’s still cold somehow — how is it almost May and it’s still cold? — but the trees finally sighed and gave in, making for some beautiful bursts of color in an otherwise concrete-gray world.

Pink, blue, and white: what seems like rare sunlight here.

The grass has barely started to grow back in after its winter under snowpack and ice, and the non-flowering trees, the sycamores and the London Planes and the pin-oaks and the like, are steadfastly refusing to turn green. But the cherry, pear, and another broad-petaled pink flower (apparently it’s a form of magnolia?) are exuberant, toasting this just-above-freezing weather we are expected to call spring.

Ft. Hamilton High School’s majestic lines softened by cherry blossoms.

More typical gray skies, with a pear tree making an attempt at flowering.

The flowers were actually out well before the trees. First, of course, came the crocuses. These little fellows were springing from the tree-pit of a very uninterested linden tree above it. They were followed by the more ostentatious daffodils and tulips and hyacinths. When I was a little girl I loved all three of those flowers. Now I’m not so interested in them. But a snowdrop is always a delight.

The snowdrops were the first to give in to spring.

It can’t help but lift one’s spirits, even while one snuggles deeper into one’s winter coat. I think there is at least a possibility that we will have one or two warm days before September and the whole freezing process starts over again.

A chance, right?

I’ll be under the covers in the meantime. Someone alert The Weather Channel: let me know when it goes above 70 degrees in New York City, okay?