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Spring Ahead

3/8/2010

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Picture
A flowering fruit tree outside Betsy Ross Hall.
Monday, March 8, 2010

Spring seems to come early to the Soldiers Home—the daffodils there are big and buttery long before mine, and some of the flowering fruit trees have already dropped their blooms. People (and squirrels!) are definitely perkier, and, just to seal the deal, the baseball diamond is bustling.

There’s a nice field of little-league dreams on the grounds of the Home—Orting Parks and Recreation maintains and uses it, and Mike has become Mr. Resident Groundskeeper this season.

The other day, he had arranged for someone to bring down a big tarp to protect the newly mounded pitchers mound. While we were waiting for him to come back, we sat outside the home-plate fence and marveled at how beautiful
everything looked. The sun was brilliant and had overnight upped its warmth setting from winter "eh" to spring "ahhh."

I noticed what appeared to be a new flagpole. One guy working on the field said they’d stripped and repainted the pole, and Mike said they’d also installed a floodlight to illuminate it at night.

"Etiquette-wise, that’s correct," he said. (At the Soldiers Home, all the flags fly beautifully, proudly and always correctly.)

And they look even more beautiful in the sunshine, and the promise, of an impending spring.
Picture
A field, and a flagpole, ready for spring.
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    Author
    My name is Sandy Deneau Dunham. I'm a journalist who’s worked at The Phoenix Gazette, The (Tacoma) News Tribune,  The Seattle Times, Town Hall Seattle and Pacific Lutheran University. I'm now back at The Seattle Times, as associate editor of its gorgeously glossy Pacific NW magazine. I've been a volunteer at the Washington Soldiers Home and Colony in Orting, Washington, since January 2009, and I am still a remedial videographer.   

     

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