The small yard outside of my unit is covered with lovely periwinkle (myrtle), Martha Washington violets – purple and white, and deep purple ones, also. All are in full bloom. It is amazing to me that these hardy plants survived the past long winter and arrived on time to be part of the spring. They are very welcome.

This time of year I often think of the wonderful walks I had during my childhood while living in Danbury. We hiked from Westville Avenue or Abbott Avenue, to nearby fields and woods that are now part of the property of the WestConn University.

One object of these hikes was to find some healthy bushes where we could get a couple of branches to take home and dry, then grate the bark to obtain the sassafras which my grandmother used to scent her homemade soap. Gramp wore his canvass fishing jacket with giant pockets to hold the fragrant twigs.

Always on these jaunts in the spring, we continued up the path toward a wooded swampy area to check out the clumps of frogs’ eggs – a glob of jelly-like mass that would soon twin into pollywogs.

Other times we followed a small brook down the sloping meadow near the woods. There was a certain big, flat rock that was our “lunch table.” Lunch consisted of peanut butter sandwiches and a few cookies packed in wrappers from the loaves of Bond Bread, which was the only source of “waxed” paper I remember. A collapsible tin cup was what we used to scoop up ice-cold water from a deep pool in the brook near the rock.

If we were lucky, we found clumps of tender green watercress in the brook itself. We would carefully fill the waxed lunch bags with this early spring delicacy. Later in the spring we went in the family car, up in the King Street area, where we collected a basketful of cows/marsh (mash marigolds), the lovely yellow blossoms and dark leaves that dot the swamps this time of year. Somehow, it was like a matter of necessity to get this greenery – a spring tonic. So was an anticipated meal when a big batch of dandelion greens were cooked to limp perfection and served with salt, pepper, and vinegar.

Friends of ours thought it a special treat to gather a batch of “fiddleheads,” which are the top stems of ferns in early spring. They have to have the “fuzz” removed from the stems, before cooking.

Nature’s bounty was used in many surprising ways. An aunt of mine who was quite elderly made pudding just about all the time. In spring she made a sauce of maple syrup to pour over plain vanilla pudding. I found the recipe for that delicacy in my favorite nature book, Using Wayside Plants. It is simple to make and I wonder why some enterprising company hasn’t manufactured it to sell.

When we lived in the Stevenson area, men came through the countryside every year to gather witch hazel bushes. By the carload, they trucked them to the plant in Trumbull, where the astringent was made. The company paid small amounts for the bushes, but most people allowed them to cut it for free. My mother used witch hazel for everything – sore muscles, mosquito bites, bee stings, etc. It has a pleasant odor.

One would be hard pressed today to find an area where long walks would be allowed – or even an available area. I learned a lot with my grandfather on these treks, and it was the beginning of my never-ending interest in all kinds of nature. Such knowledge cannot be the same from a textbook.

The ending of last week’s column was from “The Hardship of Accounting” by Robert Frost.

Remember these lines from a poem?

“In winter I get up at night and dress by yellow candlelight.

In summer, quite the other way, I have to go to bed by day.”