March 8th Quick Update: Sap’s Running

If you live in northern Vermont you know the sun is out for the first time in many days.
Oh joy.
You know that the needle on the thermometer dropped below 32 degrees for the first time in many days.
Oh joy.
You murmur, The sap’s gotta be running today, as you open some windows in your house to let the sunshine in and you let yourself out the door to sip coffee with your face to the sun.
Oh joy, but then buzz.

It’s as though contractions started for real and the baby is coming.
Breathe.
The trees are breathing but Chief of Operations is not. Adrenaline raises his voice three pitches.
Switch to the upper tanks, the lower ones are full!
Where are more diapers for the RO?
Where are you? (This person had run upstairs to grab a pair of socks.)
Buzz.

Ingrid, Jenn, and Larry pack up for tubing checks on Morningside and head up the hill. Down here it’s now quiet people-wise but noisy pump-wise. The release pump clicks off only to flick back on a few seconds later.
Buzz.
Don’t ever close the door all the way! Chops shouts as he bounds past. The pump room will get too warm!

When Sam arrives from next door we’ll fire up the arch for a “Lamoille Boil,” in the words of Shap Smith, Sr. who stopped in this week and reminisced about the good runs during his sugaring years.

Now. to quote New England legend Willem Lange, I gotta get back to work. Yikes, I smell the earth for the first time in 2024.