A Beautiful Spring Day at Penn State

A thing that I have been meaning to tell you, but I don't seem quite able to find the words, is how lovely - no, how absolutely enchanting - our Penn State campus is in springtime.

It looks like a party, or maybe a fancy dress ball . . . There are pink and purple and white flowering trees everywhere, like something from a fairy tale, or maybe a dream. Flowers are blooming in every flower bed and their scent is on the breeze. Campus is overrun with birds and bunnies and their babies. Everything is green, that sweet, tender green you only see in springtime.

If ever there was a "best" time to visit our campus, it is now. Although I suspect that maybe I say that in fall too. And maybe in summer. Do I say it in winter? I'll bet I do. Oh well!

It is early May. Spring semester has just ended, and graduation occurred over this past weekend. Town and campus can be crazy places to visit at times like that, and so I don't. I prefer the quiet times, after all the hubbub, after all the guests have gone home.

I usually telecommute on Mondays, and so I just might have missed this lovely day on campus. But I had a scheduled training event followed by a committee meeting, both at the Libraries on campus. My lunch would be provided at the Nittany Lion Inn, on a departmental tab, as part of the training event (and I did not know it yet, but it would feature two delicious favorites: the best lobster bisque I know of, and a mouth-watering Pittsburgh steak salad).

But before all of that . . . I had time before my day's obligations began for a quick walk around central campus, including the area around Old Main, which is the building to our left in this photo.

Old Main is one of our most famous buildings on campus. I've shown it to you before: from the front, and from the back. And I've shown you the now-missing twin (immortalized here) to the elm tree that appears on our right.

On this particular day, the area is nearly deserted (you can see one person walking into my shot on the far right; I usually crop the people out of scenes like this, but for some reason, I didn't mind this one, so I left him in). The redbuds are in full bloom, and the elm leaves are baby green, providing dappled shade in the morning sun. The air smells of sweet perfume. It is a beautiful day.

Soundtrack: U2, Beautiful Day.