Easter, Spring, renewal in the tropics

With Easter just passed and the many happy spring wishes, it made me pause and think how different our tropical experience is from the experience of our northern climate friends and family.

Easter is celebrated here just like elsewhere, Grenada being a largely Christian country. We even celebrate Easter Monday. Since my family lives far away, I have made sure our Easter celebration is shared with close friends, whom I call my Grenada family. Our meal reflects the many influences of our various ethnic and national backgrounds, and whereas before I insisted on making the whole meal myself, I now gladly accept dishes brought by my guests. The result is a unique, delicious mélange of dishes.

As for spring, we don’t have that in the tropics. What we have is a dry season and a rainy season. The changes between the two are less dramatic than the changes in temperate climates but changes there are. Right now we are in the dry season and the lush emerald green of the island has turned into a duller, khaki color. And, yes, there are deciduous trees, so many lose their leaves. The infinite variety of fruits diminishes, we don’t plant much and water twice a day what we do grow. The winds are quite fierce, ideal for kite flying, this being a favorite sport around Easter. The days are getting longer, the temperature is slowly climbing, in another month the rainy season will start.

Renewal comes with the rains. It’s incredible how quickly and completely the lush green returns, we get busy with gardening, cruise ships stop coming, so we have our capital and our Grand Anse beach back to ourselves. Things slow down but we still find plenty to do.
That is the good news part. The not so good news is that the weather will turn hot and humid, the winds will diminish to nothing, we have fans going day and night (hubby and I don’t like air conditioning), the mosquitoes come back. We plant a lot of food we eat but are in a constant competition with the iguanas who are impervious to all means to discourage them. Those of us who are able, try  to leave the island for as long as we can. In our case, the wedding of our first grandchild, grandson Michael Pantelios is the reason for going back to Chicago, with a stop in Columbus, Ohio to spend a few days with granddaughter Tabitha and her boyfriend Montae.

We plan to be in Chicago until the end of July. While this is not long enough to avoid the worst of the summer misery, at least it shortens it. In the meantime, if we get too uncomfortable, we can go to any number of the wonderful beaches in Grenada.