It’s that shoulder season, the time when winter has worn out its welcome and spring is only intermittent thoughts on warmer afternoons. There are the signs. The daffodils are up, as are the first snowdrops. A lonely azalea brightens a corner under the rhododendrons and the rhubarb is poking its first leaves through the winter’s leavings. But I’m still in winter mode.

I am so looking forward to leaving the house without my winter apparel. Put the heavy coat, the hat, gloves and boots away! As it is every year, the hint of warmth and sun is an annoying tease, hope poking through an off-and-on basis while the windows stay shut to keep out the remaining cold.

You know what it is like on those teasingly-infrequent warm and sunny days. All seems possible. Being comfortably outside, windows open, taking a walk, greeting friends who, like you, have been sequestered for the season, not by pathogens, but by the fear of the slipperiness of ice and maturing feet, knees and hips.

So? What to do? Can this yearning for spring mean more anxiety in a world filled with troubles?

It’s still winter, not by the calendar, but by temperatures. Staying inside is really the best option and willing myself to enjoy the things that are associated with winter’s limits seems right. I’ll make a hearty beef stew with biscuits and maybe, if the energy lasts, an apple pie. I may dream of a lovely, light chicken salad with fresh lettuce accompanied by the sound of ice in glasses filled with sweet tea on the porch, contemplating a visit to the bowling alley for ice cream, but there is nothing wrong with my winter-focused menu and if the sun’s turning continues as it has … there will be time for chicken salad on the porch.

I’ll do as my neighbor’s cat does and seek out the best environment to luxuriate in what it has to offer. “Sneakers,” the famous cat, at least in our house, whose address is a few houses away, spends his days chasing the sun on our deck and our porch or hard up to the side of another neighbor’s sunlit basement wall. And, every once in a while, I will surprise Mr. Sneakers with some treats. My old friend Linda Landinez called it “cat crack” or a cat’s delight.

My version of Sneakers will be inside. I’ll finish that book I started a month ago, comfortably ensconced in the love seat in the living room … a cup of Red Rose tea by my side. I’ll finish cleaning out my office, divesting myself of the accumulation of years of stuff that I will never use. That, in itself, is like opening a window on a warm day.

And, courtesy of the Marcellus Free Library, I will experience my own version of the delight of surprise. I picked up my Book Box this week, but I hadn’t opened it. Today was a good choice for that. And delight it was. Inside my Book Box were lovely unexpected gifts embellishing a theme, this month’s theme being “Loving Local” featuring romance writers from Central New York.Inside was a book by Oneida-based Jo McNally with a hand crocheted book mark, two pencils joyously decorated with faux flowers and a butterflies, a sweet candle, three chocolates and a tote bag. I was and am charmed by these treasures. So…now I have prompts for other days when the weather is not what I wish, opportunities to explore integrating this swag into my life. Of course, the chocolates will be the first to go, since warm weather can cause it to melt.

I should sign up for the next Book Box, but then there are others who might enjoy a trip to delights whatever the weather.

It goes back again to the idea of doing what you can with where you are and what you have. Makes sense. Did I hear geese flying north?