We weren't able to get out for our afternoon walk until late afternoon yesterday. Actually we managed to embark on our walk around the same time we returned from the ravine the day before. Just after four in the afternoon, and it was on that return that the forecasted rain began falling. And falling. Quite heavy at times, but persistent since it rained all night.

With the rain came the familiar but not-experienced since last fall episodes of thunder clanging through the atmosphere, bringing on even heavier, more copious rainfall. And so it continued throughout the day, until just after four o'clock yesterday afternoon. We seized our opportunity and cast ourselves out into the saturated environment.

We knew that others in the city had awoken that morning to lost power, and others still to the misery of flooded basements. We're situated on fairly high ground, sitting even taller than our neighbours and we've got catch-basins up and down the street on the road -- and one right at one of the corners of our backyard that our neighbours beside and in back of us empty their pool-water into.

Once we entered into the ravine and Jackie and Jillie had spurted ahead as is their habit, it seemed that despite the rain, the snowpack had hardly budged. It was softer. And because the high for the day was 5C, the spreading ice revealed under the melting snow, presented no obstacles for us as it would if we weren't wearing cleats over our boots. The street above the ravine is entirely clear of snow and ice now, though lawns still feature snowbanks, receding as they are.

We could hear the roar of the creek down below and as we approached we could see it had measurably increased in volume, furiously rushing, muddy and cresting over fallen trees that had topped into it over the years, creating little waterfalls of spume. The banks of the creek are slowly being revealed, and the hillsides above are being cleared of snow at a greater rate now that milder weather and spring rains have moved in.

Everything looks dim, dark, drab. But here and there where the forest floor has been slightly revealed we can see bright green foliage emerging; before we know it, violets, wild strawberries and other early plants will be appearing and we'll take it all for granted after the first surprise of their presence. We'll celebrate their texture and colour, putting spark into the vegetation-life of the ravine, preparing for the gradual appearance of all the familiar plants we anticipate seeing, spring after spring.

We did have one visual treat, where the melting snowpack had revealed an old tree stump now bare but for the presence of an exquisite rosette-clump of fungi. Bright green mosses too are now being revealed, none the worse for wear after their long refrigerated-hibernation, obviously impervious to the kind of effect a long submersion in an icy environment would have on tender summertime plants.