Spring? Yes, it’s spring. I know. But I’ve yet to hear Rogers and Hart’s plaintive lyrics sung.

“Spring is here, why doesn’t my heart go dancing?”

Those words were penned by Lorenz Hart who lived and died a very sad man.

“Maybe it’s because nobody needs me,” he wrote.

Yes. Spring is here.

Yes, there are spring-like things here, I’m told, but not on my property.

I would be happy to see a greener landscape emerge, purpled by irises and blushed with tiny roses, as I process the massive redo I have to take on.

OK, the story goes like this. I’m about to put our enchanted cottage, as She called it, on the cold, black and white market. I will ask $500,000 for it. That’s what she insisted on. OK. I will scale down a bit.

So, the work.

The roof on the den and back of this big place needs new shingles. That will come first. They will scatter moribund shingles all about the driveway. They’ll deal with it.

Second: The basement needs enormous love and kisses. Who doesn’t?

The space above the upstairs three rooms? Yes. There’s something up there at night. Distant piano, I think. The builder says there is not. What does a builder know about dancing ghosts and the music they brought with them from long ago?

OK. I used to have a recurring dream of a young soldier from the Great War singing to his girl on the front porch on a summer night. I have dreams like everybody else.

Cut to completion. Keep the dying grass cut. Paint here and there. Keep the carpets and windows wiped, have someone plant some new flowers. Everyone likes flowers. Hang the sign and wave at passing cars.

OK, readers. Imagine the enchanted cottage is sold. After freeing the collection of pine-scented magic, old photos of nameless folks, and furniture of 40 years, after playing Lorenz Hart’s song, I wipe the tears off the piano keys, pack up, drive away, hold my breath and don’t wave. Don’t look back.

I arrive back in the City of Angels, and I’m quickly folded into two busy families busy with the work of film land.

We will chat over dinners on their patios about creating either a weekly series or a new family comedy film called “Daddy’s Back.” It will feature a father, an aging but still handsome actor/writer, newly arrived back in L.A. from the “verdant woods” of central Maine, arriving at the doorsteps of his Hollywood kids.

Daddy is well loved. After a few dinners where “plans” are discussed, there is talk about installing him, like new plumbing, in a comfortable one bedroom apartment in a quiet(?) neighborhood.

“Quiet” in the suburbs of Los Angeles is not exactly the same as it is on the rustic banks of the Kennebec on a winter’s night. A quiet place in the City of Angels, if one can be found, is very expensive.

So there’s a scenario for you. Like all scripts, it can be rewritten, locations changed, lighting softened. It’s not real life you know. It’s was just a movie … wasn’t it?

J.P. Devine is a Waterville writer.