April by the river: Happy returns, and much waiting

From the riverbank at Penn Treaty Park beneath I-95 one day last week you could contemplate the Delaware's ritual of indecision - the day's estuarial tide pushing back, stymieing the natural inclination of the current.

Early April is like that; an in-between season, downpours at the ready, chill in the night, then days in the 80s, sunny as daffodils, which appear to be on their way out, the azaleas stepping up.

At the Fair Food Farmstand in the Reading Terminal Market, the people come and go, speaking of local asparagus.

The Easter-Passover weekend's warm glow put customers in mind of midsummer. But the circadian play of light and dark, and the internal temperature of the soil (and the sogginess of the fields), signaled a different pace: We're not beyond threat of frost. We're Pennsylvania, not Salinas.

The asparagus, thank you, is biding its time; give it a few more weeks. (And several more, probably June, before it's time to think about the first sweet cartons of Lancaster County strawberries.)

As consolation, there have been bunches of fragrant mint from New Jersey (snapped up and gone in a flash!), and young strands of green garlic; Rose Finn Apples from Hustontown, Pa., which are potatoes, not apples; and floppy ears of early chard.

At Seventh and Christian on Friday, it was opening day for John's Water Ice, its counter window on the street back in service, the menu unchanged - chocolate, lemon, cherry, and, best, almost-creamy pineapple.

It was time to put plans and pipe dreams in motion. At the Reading market, the tide was running two ways: Earl Livengood, the diffident Lancaster County farmer who sold local organic produce there for years, said he was branching out, setting up this spring at farm markets in Bryn Mawr and King of Prussia.

On the other side of the ledger, Reading Terminal announced it would add its own Sunday open-air market - if you can't beat 'em, join 'em - on 12th Street, starting with 14 local producers by mid-May.

A new pizza place (or maybe gelato shop) was on the mind of Peter McAndrews, whose Paesano's "Philly-style" sandwich joint on Girard Avenue in Fishtown has already spawned a second, and larger, one in the Italian Market.

A few blocks east on Girard, Shadfest banners were hung at Johnny Brenda's, the Fishtown bar, marking the April run of shad in the Delaware. (The festival is April 24. But the shad it will serve are out-of-towners, the local run far too puny nowadays to feed the masses, or even the dozens.)

And even farther east, in sight of the Delaware itself, John Danze, the proprietor of Johnny's Hots, was moved to muse on his own in-between time on the ambivalent river.

The tide of working stiffs who are his customers had ebbed somewhat as thousands of union carpenter and electrician jobs dried up.

But with the SugarHouse Casino going up on Delaware Avenue, he has seen a fresh gust of new customers for (among other specialties) his storied hot sausage, fish cake, and pepper hash combo.

Along the river, it is the season once again of giveth and of taketh away - not necessarily, of course, in that order.