NEW PALTZ, N.Y. - "MARCH is the month of expectation," Emily Dickinson wrote so plainly and so presciently up there in her agoraphobic attic in Amherst, Mass., that it seems she actually understood the early spring frenzy surrounding Berkshire summer rentals more than 100 years later.
March is generally so miserable, muddy, cold and nasty that it's hardly worth the 31 days it takes to get to April. But every so often there is a warm afternoon, then the nub of a bulb pushing through the thawing earth, which is inevitably followed by those first glorious bursts of ads on Craigslist and in the Village Voice touting idyllic summer cottages in the cool mountains of Stockbridge and on the warm beaches of Amagansett. And suddenly you're thinking about a summer getaway.