The robins are confused and the green dress

It is snowing. It is almost mid-April, and snow covers the grass and the trees. It's pretty, and it's melting on the pavement, so it's not really affecting travel too much.

It's beginning to feel a lot like Christmas! And we just celebrated Easter!

Today I saw a bunch (what is a group of them called, anyway?) of robins standing confusedly in a patch of snow. No worms will come out of the frozen ground, I'm thinkin'.

It's been a pretty busy week at work after a restful Easter weekend. The Sound of Music, my absolute all-time favorite movie, was on three times this weekend. (No, I didn't watch it each time.) But I did notice something I've never seen before.

The green dress.

Do any of you SOM fans know what I'm talking about?

The scene is the abby. Maria has returned after her confusion about her feelings for the Captain. She has been in seclusion, but the Reverend Mother thinks it's time she talked about why she came back. The Reverend Mother is greeting a "novice" who is coming for the first time to the abby to join the celebate group. As Maria waits in the corner, the RM dismisses the novice with a "Welcome, my child" (or something like that) and then "Take her to the robing room."

Flash back to Maria's first encounter with the Captain. She is wearing a dreadful dress--very gray and coarse-looking. The captain is dismayed by her apparel, but she said that all the worldly goods she had were given to the poor when she entered the convent. "What about this one?" the Captain asks of the ugly dress. "Oh, the poor didn't want this one."

Now back to the novice going to the robing room. She is wearing a simple, but pretty, green dress. Then comes the scene where the RM convinces Maria to go back to the Captain to find out if this love thing is real between them. The classic "Climb Every Mountain" is sung.

Next scene: the Captain's children, missing Maria, start to sing "Raindrops on Roses" to see if the song Maria taught them will cheer them up. Suddenly, a familiar voice joins the chorus. It is Maria, clad in guess what---THE GREEN DRESS!

As many times as I've seen this moving, I don't know why I never gave the Green Dress the significance it obviously has. Green represents new life--a new beginning: a pretty dress, a fresh start at love. Why else would this novice have any significance in the story line? The screen writer didn't have to include her in the script, but we needed to know where Maria got the green dress from.

Anyway, I thought that was cool. I also think these temperatures are too cool. I heard 60s are promised for the weekend.

And although "snowflakes that stay on my nose and eyelashes" are some of my favorite things so are "silver white winters that melt into spring."

Emphasis on the "melt into spring" part. We're ready to go from gray days with white snow to days dressed in green.

I'm ready to trade my turtleneck sweaters for a bright green spring dress.

Till next time,


Suzi