. .’ Statement taken from Mason Brand’s journal dated June 19th, 2001 8 To Mason Brand the cycle of the seasons was the kind of certainty you could stake your life on. Predicting the actual weather, on the other hand; that was an idiot’s pastime. Especially this spring. For days there had been extremes that no forecasts had prepared people for. Monday had been cold, bright and crackle dry. Tuesday, the rain was as warm and heavy as a monsoon. The chill had returned on Wednesday and the rain had turned to snow - four inches of it that soon became a depressing brown slush. Reports said storms were moving in. Mason ignored forecasts. Each day he took a broad-brimmed, brown wax hat and a coat of the same material into the vegetable plot with him. Under the coat he wore three more layers, just in case. In his weathered, padlocked shed at the far end of the middle strip of his three planting beds, he kept his tools and a reclaimed pine chair.
