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The Coconut Grove

I am, I’ve discovered, a practitioner of a particular form of procrastination ; one that I didn’t even realize I was doing for the longest time, but also one that is (worryingly) deceptively convincing to fall for. I am someone who doesn’t actually do a thing, but thinks that they have, and so certain things just… don’t get done.

That’s not the full story, of course. What actually happens is this: I have a task that needs done — and this is always “a task that needs done,” as opposed to something that just pops up or happens — and, because I think about it for a second and identify what needs to be done, part of my brain just moves it to the file marked “completed” and moves on. Because I’ve identified the problem, the problem is solved, my head goes, and that’s that. Even though, you know, the actual practical aspect of the whole thing, that whole “really doing it” part, hasn’t actually taken place.

This is a trap that I build for myself over and over again, without knowing it. Why were there uncashed checks lying on my desk for three weeks? Because I had thought, oh, I need to take those to the bank and then assumed it had already been taken care of. What about the library books that were overdue for pick up? Well, I’d remembered that I needed to do it, so it was as if it was already done, right? Right?

I’m not entirely sure what this says about me, beyond the fact that I clearly conceptualize tasks as being primarily problems to be solved in my head and then everything that follows is an unnecessary afterthought, but it’s something I need to work on if I want to, you know, stay financially solvent and avoid late fees on everything in my life on a regular basis.

For now, just know that if I’m late or seemingly absent from an obligation we’ve agreed on, chances are I’ve already given it some thought and then just moved on, unwittingly. That’s got to be worth something, surely.

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And So Awake

I’ve been reading The Name of This Band is R.E.M. A Biography lately, and it’s got me nostalgic for the fact that, for a good number of years there, R.E.M. was the band I was unmistakably a fan of. I think everyone’s been there at some point in their life if music has been in any way important to them: having a band that you listen to and identify with a bit too much, and find yourself spending too much time thinking about.

From Out of Time through… New Adventures in Hi-Fi, probably…? that was R.E.M. for me; I bought the albums — Automatic for the People was the first CD I ever owned! — and the singles alike; I even bought the videos and bootlegs and read books about the band, too. (Not much changes there, I guess.) I had feelings about what B-sides should have been on albums, and what songs should have been singles if only someone had listened to me, whose teenage wisdom was obviously very important on such topics. R.E.M. was my band.

These days, I rarely listen to them, unless I’m feeling particularly nostalgic. Now that we’re a quarter-century out from my intense love affair with the band, it strikes me that their longest lasting effect on me wasn’t aural, but visual; the aforementioned videos and the album sleeves (and tour program art, when I saw them in 1995 or 1996 for the Monster tour, whenever that was) all had an unmistakable impact on me was I was developing my visual language at the same time as I was preparing for, and then starting, my art school career.

I wasn’t aware I was doing it at the time, I don’t think; certainly, when I first started getting into the band musically, I didn’t really spend too much time analyzing the album covers of Document and Eponymous and Green as I got them out of the local library over and over again. (That’s not true; I was fascinated by the texture of the black lines on Green‘s cover, for some reason.) By the time Out of Time and certainly Automatic for the People were coming out, though, and my obsession was at its height, I remember being fully aware of looking at the type choices, or considering why that particular photo had been chosen versus any other options. (I can still remember feeling just a little bit disappointed by the obvious Photoshop filter on the Automatic album cover.) Perhaps more than any single other influence, R.E.M. shaped what I thought looked good, and also what I thought I wanted to create for myself.

At this point, I’m not sure if I should thank them for that, or regret that I didn’t latch onto something more immediately commercial, given how my art and design career went. What could have happened had I found myself obsessed with the visual stylings of, I don’t know, whoever designed Heat magazine or something similar…!

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I’m Not Uncomfortable Feeling Weird

As I’ve already written about, in many respects, April was an aberration of a month — a period that I can look back at already with no shortage of, huh, that was weird. Not bad, by any degree (in many ways, it was a better month than most, if not all, so far this year), but certainly an odd one that threw all of my rhythms out of whack in ways that were probably good for me.

Much of this was work related; there was a full two-and-a-half weeks where I wasn’t working my traditional Monday-Friday schedule for multiple external reasons, which made for an interesting, exhausting experience. The long and the short of it is was that I probably worked more hours than I would have otherwise, but at entirely different times; I worked two weekends in a row, for example, and there were three days where I was working what we called “Japanese hours,” because it was to cover a show in Tokyo, but in practice it meant 13 hour shifts that ended around 1am, which is a problem when my body clock refuses to let me sleep past 6am any given morning.

(There were also a couple mornings where my head decided to get so stressed about things that ultimately don’t matter that I woke up around 4am and couldn’t get back to sleep; those were fun too, he lied.)

What’s more interesting to me looking back, though, was what I did in response to all of this external stress: I read more, and watched more movies, in what little downtime I did have. I went for more walks, as the weather improved, and realized that exercise and seeing other human beings instead of staring at walls was actually good for me. I went to the movies; I found new restaurants to eat at. It felt as if, for the first time this entire calendar year, I was proactively finding space for doing things that felt good, and were good for me, instead of just trying to keep my head above water the entire time.

It’s a nice feeling. I should do more of that, I think.

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The Movies of April 2025

Now that, my friends, is more like it. After a few months of not really watching that many movies, I got back up to speed and then some in April — there’s a lot of old favorites in the list below, but what stands out more are the new favorites: Sinners, obviously, was something that just left me in awe and in love, just such a good movie (and such a good vampire movie, at that), but that might sit behind Burnt Milk as my favorite discovery of the month — a short movie that’s basically a spoken word piece with some amazing cinematography that felt at once intensely intimate and speaking to a larger truth that’s difficult to articulate. (It’s on The Criterion Channel, which is where I found it; maybe it’s available elsewhere, but it’s worth searching out nonetheless.)

Also a lot of fun: Companion, Shampoo, and Orson Welles’ The Trial, which I’d never seen before, and which feels very contemporary in the way it’s shot. (And its paranoia, for that matter.) Less fun: Little Murders and You’re A Big Boy Now, two movies in Criteron’s unofficial “New York City in the ’60s and ’70s was a mess” curated collection, both of which proved to be a little too unintentionally misanthropic and misogynistic for my contemporary tastes. (You’re A Big Boy Now also has a brief, pointless sequence that might be the most racist thing I’ve ever seen in a mainstream movie, and I think it was intended as pointed comedy against racism…!)

Also also: not pictures in the graphic below because I finished it after the screenshot: Spike Lee’s Malcolm X, which was absolutely fucking amazing; I have a vague memory of seeing it around when it came out, but I’m almost convinced that has to be wrong, because I was so blown away by it this time around…!

But I digress. What I meant to say is, this is what I watched this past month:

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The Comics of April 2025

When I was a kid, John Byrne’s Fantastic Four was the bee’s knees for reasons I didn’t fully understand. I didn’t even read that many issues of it when it was coming out — maybe a handful of issues towards the back end of the run, when I found them imported in newsagents or reprinted in the UK version of Secret Wars — but for some reason, I instinctively thought of it as the idealized Marvel superhero book. Reading it in full as an adult a few years back for Baxter Building on the Wait, What? podcast with Jeff made me realize how wrong I was (the idealized Marvel superhero book was really the Lee/Kirby run), but I ended up diving back into it in April in my attempt to continue a nightly reading routine, and it’s… better than I gave it credit for last time, maybe? Perhaps some things just read better in serialized format. Or it could be that my mind has just decayed to the point where I can’t tell what’s good or bad anymore. (See also me reading the full Alan Grant-written run of Marvel’s very disappointing 1990s RoboCop comic.)

Anyway: here’s what I read, comic-wise, in April.

  1. All-New Venom #5
  2. Daredevil: Cold Day in Hell #1
  3. X-Men (2024) #14
  4. West Coast Avengers (2024) #6
  5. Fantastic Four (1961) #95
  6. The Mighty Thor (1966) #172
  7. Captain America (1968) #341
  8. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #412
  9. Invincible #51
  10. Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1974) #s 233-235
  11. Star Trek (1989) #30
  12. Fantastic Four (1961) #96
  13. The Mighty Thor (1966) #173
  14. Captain America (1968) #342
  15. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #413
  16. Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1974) #236
  17. Astonishing Spider-Man Infinity Comic #s 21-22
  18. All-Star Comics #68
  19. JLA/JSA: Virtue and Vice OGN
  20. Superman (2023) #25
  21. Justice League Unlimited (2024) #6
  22. Superman: The Last Days of Lex Luthor #3
  23. Batman (2016) #159
  24. Green Lantern (2023) #22
  25. Invincible #s 52-54
  26. Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1974) #237
  27. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #s 414-416
  28. Superboy (1949) #s 195, 197 (Legion of Super-Heroes stories only)
  29. Helen of Wyndhorn #1
  30. Fantastic Four (1961) #97
  31. The Mighty Thor (1966) #174
  32. Captain America (1968) #343
  33. Hulk: Future Imperfect #s 1-2
  34. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #417
  35. Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1974) #s 238-242
  36. Metamorpho, The Element Man (2024) #5
  37. Absolute Martian Manhunter #2
  38. Superboy (1949) #s 198-199
  39. Fantastic Four (1961) #98
  40. The Mighty Thor (1966) #175
  41. Captain America (1968) #344
  42. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #418
  43. It’s Jeff! Infinity Comic #45
  44. Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1974) #s 243-244
  45. Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1974) #s 200-201
  46. Fantastic Four (1961) #99
  47. The Mighty Thor (1966) #176
  48. Captain America (1968) #345
  49. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #419
  50. Invincible #s 55-58
  51. The Batman Adventures (1992) #s 1-3
  52. Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1974) #s 202-203
  53. Fantastic Four (1961) #100
  54. The Mighty Thor (1966) #177
  55. Captain America (1968) #346
  56. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #420
  57. Fantastic Four (1961) #101
  58. The Mighty Thor (1966) #178
  59. Captain America (1968) #347
  60. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #421
  61. Kingdom Come #s 2-3
  62. The Batman Adventures (1992) #s 4-5
  63. Fantastic Four (1961) #s 102-104 (End of the Lee/Kirby era!)
  64. The Mighty Thor (1966) #s 179-181 (End of the Lee/Kirby era!)
  65. Fantastic Four (1961) #232 (First Byrne)
  66. Captain America (1968) #348
  67. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #s 422-423
  68. The Mighty Thor Annual (1966) #5
  69. Kingdom Come #4
  70. The Batman Adventures (1992) #6
  71. Invincible #s 59-67
  72. Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1974) #s 245-247
  73. The Amazing Spider-Man (2025) #1
  74. Robocop (1990) #1
  75. Captain America (1968) #349
  76. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #424
  77. Fantastic Four (1961) #233
  78. Justice Society of America (2007) #s 13-15
  79. The Question: All Along the Watchtower #6
  80. Batman/Superman: World’s Finest Annual #1
  81. Detective Comics Annual (2025) #1
  82. Firekind
  83. Robocop (1990) #2
  84. Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1974) #s 204-206
  85. Robocop (1990) #3
  86. Fantastic Four (1961) #s 234-235
  87. Captain America (1968) #350
  88. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #425
  89. Astonishing Spider-Man Infinity Comic #23
  90. The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones #s 4-5
  91. Fantastic Four (1961) #236
  92. Captain America (1968) #351
  93. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #426
  94. The Power Company Recharged #1
  95. Justice Society of America (2007) #s 16-17
  96. The Further Adventures of Indiana Jones #6
  97. Robocop (1990) #4
  98. Justice Society of America Annual (2008) #1
  99. Justice Society of America (2007) #18
  100. Web of Spider-Man (1985) #s 14-15
  101. Mystik U #1
  102. Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1974) #s 248-252
  103. Justice Society of America (2007) #s 19-20
  104. Justice Society of America: Kingdom Come Special – Superman #1
  105. Justice Society of America: Kingdom Come Special – Magog #1
  106. Justice Society of America: Kingdom Come Special – The Kingdom #1
  107. Justice Society of America (2007) #s 21-22
  108. Invincible #s 68-70
  109. Invincible Returns #1
  110. Robocop (1990) #5
  111. Fantastic Four (1961) #237
  112. Captain America (1968) #352
  113. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #427
  114. It’s Jeff! Infinity Comic #46
  115. The Batman Adventures (1992) #7
  116. Justice Society of America (2007) #s 23-27
  117. Nick Fury vs SHIELD #s 1-2
  118. Fantastic Four (1961) #238
  119. Captain America (1968) #353
  120. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #428
  121. Invincible #s 71-96
  122. Justice Society of America (2007) #s 28-29
  123. The Batman Adventures (1992) #8
  124. Helen of Wyndhorn #2
  125. Web of Spider-Man (1985) #s 16-27
  126. Justice Society of America (2007) #s 30-33
  127. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #s 429-431
  128. The Batman Adventures (1992) #s 9-10
  129. Marvel Rivals Infinity Comic #7
  130. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #s 432, 434 (#433 unavailable on Marvel Unlimited?)
  131. Fantastic Four (1961) #239
  132. Captain America (1968) #354
  133. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #s 433, 435-439
  134. The Batman Adventures (1992) #s 11-12
  135. Justice Society of America (2007) #34
  136. JSA All-Stars #1
  137. Fantastic Four (1961) #240
  138. Captain America (1968) #s 355-357
  139. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #440
  140. JSA All-Stars #s 2-3
  141. Justice Society of America (2007) #s 35-40
  142. JSA All-Stars #s 4-6
  143. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #s 441-450
  144. The Batman Adventures (1992) #s 13-14
  145. Robocop (1990) #6
  146. Exquisite Corpses #1
  147. Fantastic Four (1961) #241
  148. Captain America (1968) #358
  149. Astonishing Spider-Man Infinity Comic #24
  150. Black Canary: The Best of the Best #6
  151. Justice League: The Atom Project #5
  152. JSA (2024) #7
  153. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #451
  154. The Batman Adventures (1992) #15
  155. Justice League of America (2006) #s 44-48
  156. Justice Society of America (2007) #s 41-43
  157. Fantastic Four (1961) #242
  158. Captain America (1968) #359
  159. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #s 452-454
  160. X-Factor (2024) #9
  161. Superior Avengers #1
  162. Star Wars: The Legacy of Vader #3
  163. Iron Man (2024) #7
  164. Exceptional X-Men #8
  165. Concert of Champions #1
  166. Star Trek (1989) #31
  167. JSA All-Stars #7
  168. Robocop (1990) #s 6-7
  169. Fantastic Four (1961) #243
  170. Captain America (1968) #360
  171. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #s 455-456
  172. The Batman Adventures (1992) #16
  173. Superboy and the Legion of Super-Heroes (1974) #s 253-258
  174. Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #259
  175. Robocop (1990) #8
  176. Fantastic Four (1961) #244
  177. Captain America (1968) #361
  178. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #457
  179. Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #s 260-261
  180. The Batman Adventures (1992) #17
  181. The Amazing Spider-Man (1963) #216
  182. The Incredible Hulk (1962) ## 458-460
  183. Heroes Reborn: The Return #s 1-4
  184. Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #s 262-265
  185. Helen of Wyndhorn #s 3-6
  186. Robocop (1990) #9
  187. Fantastic Four (1961) #245
  188. Captain America (1968) #362
  189. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #461
  190. It’s Jeff! Infinity Comic #47
  191. Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #s 266-267
  192. Robocop (1990) #10
  193. Fantastic Four (1961) #246
  194. Captain America (1968) #363
  195. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #462
  196. JSA All-Stars #s 8-11
  197. Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #s 268-271
  198. The Batman Adventures (1992) #18
  199. Justice Society of America (2007) #s 44-49
  200. Invincible #s 97-104
  201. Fantastic Four (1961) #247
  202. Captain America (1968) #364
  203. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #463
  204. Justice Society of America (2007) #s 50-54
  205. Axel Pressbutton #s 1-3
  206. Fantastic Four (1961) #248
  207. Captain America (1968) #365
  208. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #464
  209. G.I. Joe (2024) #6
  210. The Power Fantasy #8
  211. Youngblood Deluxe #1
  212. JSA All-Stars #s 12-13
  213. Spector: Incorruptible
  214. JSA All-Stars #s 14-18
  215. The Batman Adventures (1992) #19
  216. Invincible #s 105-107
  217. Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #272
  218. The New Golden Age #1
  219. Axel Pressbutton #s 4-5
  220. The Amazing Spider-Man (2025) #2
  221. Avengers (2023) #25
  222. One World Under Doom #3
  223. X-Men (2024) #15
  224. Fantastic Four (1961) #249
  225. Captain America (1968) #366
  226. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #465
  227. Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #273
  228. Justice Society of America (2022) #s 1-2
  229. Final Crisis: Superman Beyond #1
  230. Axel Pressbutton #6
  231. Six months’ worth of The Phoenix (Yes, really, six months of a weekly comic)
  232. Fantastic Four (1961) #250
  233. Captain America (1968) #367
  234. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #466
  235. Astonishing Spider-Man Infinity Comic #25
  236. Marvel Rivals Infinity Comic #8
  237. Final Crisis: Superman Beyond #2
  238. Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #274
  239. The Batman Adventures (1992) #20
  240. Justice Society of America (2022) #s 3-6
  241. Stargirl: The Lost Children #1
  242. Invincible #s 108-122
  243. Action Comics #1086
  244. Batman and Robin (2023) #21
  245. Laser Eraser and Pressbutton #1
  246. Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #s 275-276
  247. The Incredible Hulk (1962) #467 (Final Peter David)
  248. The Amazing Spider-Man (1963) #217
  249. Fantastic Four (1961) #251
  250. Captain America (1968) #368
  251. Justice Society of America (2022) #s 7-8
  252. Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #s 277-280
  253. Invincible #s 123-132
  254. Fantastic Four (1961) #252
  255. Captain America (1968) #369
  256. It’s Jeff! Infinity Comic #48
  257. Marvel Rivals Infinity Comic #9
  258. Justice Society of America (2022) #s 9-12
  259. Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #s 281-282
  260. Invincible #s 133-144
  261. Captain Marvel (2000) #s 0-5
  262. The Incredible Hulk: The End #1
  263. The Spectacular Spider-Man (1976) #s 134-136
  264. The Sensational She-Hulk (1988) #12
  265. Wolverine: Global Jeopardy
  266. Spider-Man: The Trial of Venom
  267. Mommy Blog #1
  268. Fantastic Four (1961) #s 253-254
  269. Captain America (1968) #370
  270. Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #283
  271. Spider-Man 2099 (1992) #s 1-3
  272. JSA (2024) #1
  273. Laser Eraser and Pressbutton #2
  274. Fantastic Four (1961) #s 255-256
  275. Captain America (1968) #371
  276. Captain Marvel (2000) #s 6-7
  277. Spider-Man 2099 (1992) #4
  278. Legion of Super-Heroes (1980) #284
  279. JSA (2024) #s 2-7
  280. DC vs. Vampires: World War V #s 7-9
  281. The Amazing Spider-Man (1963) #s 218-221
  282. The New Defenders #128
  283. Batman (2016) #s 158-159
  284. The New Defenders #s 129-130
  285. Absolute Green Lantern #2
  286. Secret Six (2025) #3
  287. Laser Eraser and Pressbutton #3
  288. Fantastic Four (1961) #257
  289. Captain America (1968) #s 372-377
  290. Captain Marvel (2000) #8
  291. Predator vs. Spider-Man #1
  292. Laser Eraser and Pressbutton #s 4-5
  293. Fantastic Four (2022) #31
  294. Godzilla vs. Spider-Man #1
  295. Laser Eraser and Pressbutton #6
  296. Ultimate Spider-Man (2024) #16
  297. Fantastic Four (1961) #258
  298. Captain America (1968) #379
  299. Captain Marvel (2000) #9
  300. Astonishing Spider-Man Infinity Comic #26
  301. Planet Death #0
  302. The Batman Adventures (1992) #s 21-22
  303. Batman the Long Halloween: The Last Halloween #s 0-1
  304. The Batman Adventures (1992) #23
  305. Batman the Long Halloween: The Last Halloween #s 2-7
  306. Heavy Metal (2025) #1
  307. All-Flash #1
  308. The Saga of Crystal, Crystal Warrior #1
  309. Fantastic Four (1961) #259
  310. The Thing (1983) #s 1-4
  311. Captain America (1968) #380
  312. The Batman Adventures (1992) #24
  313. Captain Marvel (2000) #s 10-13
  314. Captain America (1968) #381
  315. Alpha Flight Annual #1
  316. Fantastic Four (1961) #260
  317. The Thing (1983) #s 5-6
  318. Captain America (1968) #382
  319. Captain Marvel (2000) #14
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On Feeling Unsteady

April was always going to be an odd month, this year; there was a two-and-a-bit week period right in the middle of the month where my work schedule low-key imploded (intentionally so, but no less disruptively; there were conventions and editing and things that needed to be done that knocked my regular schedule and routine on their head) that felt like a black hole, pulling everything into it and warping the sense of reality surrounding it. There was a stretch where I worked eight days straight without a break, with a few of those days really long ones, and by the end of that, I felt notably off, as if my head has simply run out of power.

The thing about all of this, though, is that it’s happening at the same time as everything in the rest of the world — or, really, the rest of the country, with what used to be called “norms” and “the rule of law” breaking down at such speed and with such severity that it only added to the sense of having accidentally fallen off the face of the Earth and ended up somewhere that looked kind of the same but was notably, importantly, different in such a way that I couldn’t actually explain.

(At the end of that eight-day work stretch, I sat down to look at the news for the first time and saw that Trump was planning to withdraw all funding for public broadcasting; it seemed at once inevitable and the kind of thing that someone would object to, if we weren’t all exhausted by objecting to everything else that is arguably more important.)

There’s something to be said for that liminal feeling, when things just don’t feel entirely right, but not necessarily wrong, either. Even in such dire circumstances, to be able to sit there in that feeling just for a few moments and feel lost but not terrified is a wonderfully freeing thing.

And then, of course, reality sets in and you remember to be terrified again.

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When May is Rushing Over You

The wonderful thing about Spring is how easily I forget it after it’s finished each year.

Despite how that sounds, I don’t mean that sarcastically, or as any type of warning that I actually hate Spring and look forward to it ending every year — just the opposite, in fact. What used to be one of my least favorite seasons (I’m an October baby, I’m naturally predisposed to the fall, what can I say?) has become more and more of a highlight the older I get, and the longer I stay in Portland with its lengthy and emotionally difficult winters. (Man, the unrelenting greyness gets to you after awhile.)

That said, I feel as if Spring is something I remember in the abstract, at best; I know in theory that everything comes into bloom and plants sprout new life, and the sun starts to shine, and all that good stuff. If you asked me to describe the kind of thing that happens in the season, I could do that, no problem. I just forget what it looks like, is all. And then, each Spring, there will come a moment when I’m out on a walk, and I look up and see all the trees covered in their new growth and it takes my breath away.

It reminds me of something I realized when I was back in my hometown for the first time in years, back in 2023; I went for a walk in the early morning before anyone else was up, it felt like, and there was a point where I realized that I’d grown up surrounded by beauty and nature, and hadn’t even noticed at the time. There was such lush greenery all around me, and it had become alien enough that I noticed it again, and appreciated it as if it was new.

I get that every Spring here. There’s a point where I suddenly remember that there’s all this life happening all around me in such colors and varieties, and I feel humbled and touched at the same time. I always forget how genuinely beautiful Spring can be, and I actually love that; every year, I get to see everything new and fresh and fall in love all over again.