April is the month of yellow around these parts.

The daffodils finally burst into bloom last week and dandelions along with them. Country roadsides have exploded into an earthly vision of sunshine with forsythia. The shrubs are packed so tightly together, their branches so thick and intertwined, that even the cleverest rabbit would have a hard time navigating them.

And since yesterday, the goldfinches, those canaries of the wild, have overtaken our bird feeders (at least when they can wrest a few perches from the squirrels). At this very moment, I look outside to see half a dozen of the lemony-yellow birds crowded on the feeder outside the living room window, with more waiting in the wings—flitting in the rhododendron, sitting on branches of the nearby mountain ash, even perching on the windowsill.

Everything about goldfinches is showy—bright yellow feathers glowing next to raven-colored wings, sweet soprano chirps filling the air, bouncing flight patterns giddily announcing, “We’re back!”

Ten days ago, the day heralding April, we watched snow falling outside the very window where the finches now gather. Exactly six months ago, the colors were inverted. At ground level, nature was browning. The color was in the trees-—the rich, muted reds and bronzes of fall. Today, our trees are still bare. To see most of today’s colors requires looking down instead of up, down towards the earth from which they are being birthed.

April yellows are the yellowest yellows. Like spring itself, the yellow of daffodils, dandelions, forsythia, and goldfinches is a symbol of happiness, hope, energy, our very life force.

April is a good time to be alive.