On Sunday I decided to wash my car and, coincidentally, the next day the trees in my neighborhood decided to hop on the love train.

For the past few weeks it’s been coming, warning you via watery eyes and a scratchy throat and now pollen season is in full swing.

We all know pollen is a sign of spring as well as a sign that trees even feel the need to get frisky sometimes too. As the one South Carolina Forestry Commission spokesperson put it in an article I recently read, “Throughout the Southeast the yellow pine is in full romantic mode.”

I’m not sure if we have yellow pine around here, but the love bug has definitely bit our trees and plants. And the byproduct is that irksome pollen dust all over our cars.

Unfortunately, I have a blue car (or at least I did before Monday; now it’s more like yellow), which seems to attract pollen like a moth to a flame.

This year pollen has not just attacked my car, but has attacked the pollen that’s on top of the pollen that is on top of the pollen already caked on my car.

Despite its condition, I’ve decided to not waste the money to wash my car until all of the pollen has fallen.

Of course the downfall to all of this is having a nasty looking car—which is pretty embarrassing. For example, while driving to Jackson the other night for a Northampton County Board of Education meeting I was feeling slightly subconscious.

I couldn’t help but feel that every one I passed was looking at my car and feeling the urge to write with their finger, “WASH ME!” on the rear window.

There’s a part of me that believes my mom doesn’t believe me when I tell her of how bad it is. We don’t see stuff like this in New York. The cool springs often bring rain showers which keep pollen levels down in the air.

I don’t think she’s ever seen this much pollen and if she did it may make her change her mind about making North Carolina her permanent residence in the future.

In the meantime, I’m praying for the rain to come tonight as forecasted.

Amanda VanDerBroek is a Staff Writer for the Roanoke-Chowan News-Herald. For comments and column suggestions email: amanda.vanderbroek@r-cnews.com or call (252) 332-7209.