January

Last day of January. Pickup trucks full of sugar making equipment seen on the roads. Was talking with Nathan who taps the trees on our place, and he said they might be tapping pretty soon. That was back when the weather was unseasonably warm. It's supposed to get colder.

tree

Saw a car the other day with a Christmas tree on top. They must have been heading to some kind of designated drop off. I would have laughed at them except we still had our tree up in the living room. Finally took it down the other day. Pine needles scattered everywhere as I carted it to the burn pile. It was really a beautiful  tree, however. Got it at a spot in Castletown for $20. Allyn told her friends about it at bone builders, and they were a little upset. They had gotten their trees at the same place but paid $35.
I told Allyn there was a section at the lot with discounted trees. Sometimes on the weekends, I look a little scruffier than usual. I drove in there that Saturday in my old Dodge Ram pickup truck which looks considerably worse that I do even on my worst days. The salesman had immediately taken me to the discount area. Maybe he didn't think I would be able to pony up $35. Those old trucks are great!

wild and crazy

Sights and sounds of winter. Sound of the snow plow in the morning. Sound of scraping ice off the windshield. Pileated woodpecker flying across the back field in their own devil-may-care manner. Speaking of sounds, they have a wild and crazy call. Speaking of wild and crazy, have a happy birthday, Shawner!

open

Woke up to snow in the front yard. Recently we have had warm temperatures and an open winter. Squirrels running around in the open. Open water on Wood's Pond in Brandon. Dog sticking his head out of an open car window in Center Rutland. Gradually temperatures are supposed to cool off.

snow day

Woke up to a phone call indicating that Allyn's school its closed today. I work at the VAC, and it turns out they're also closed so we both have a snow day. It's not exactly a snow day, more like an ice, sleet, freezing rain day. Technically I'm retired, but life circumstances usually have me heading somewhere, doing something, so this is a welcome event.

sisters

I went to the winter's farmers market in Rutland on Saturday. I was kind of footloose and fancy free because Allyn and her sisters, and about a half million other women were raising hell in Washington over the weekend. About a third of the stalls that are usually open were closed. I talked with the woman from whom I bought a leek and some cabbage. I said it seemed a little quiet in there today. She said that many people were either in Washington or Montpelier protesting. I love this place. 

dawn

Three mornings a week I head out to a meditation in Rutland. I'll be leaving in about 10 minutes. It usually starts a little after 7:00. It wasn't long ago that the sitting started out in complete darkness. Now it is light when we start.
Yesterday afternoon Allyn drove to Albany to meet up with one of her sisters. Today they are driving to Washington for tomorrow's march. All four sisters are meeting up there. Hope all goes well.

Rise free from care before the dawn and seek adventures. Let the noon find thee by other lakes, and night overtake thee, everywhere at home.

Walden
Henry David Thoreau

fox

Allyn and I saw the fox out our kitchen window this evening. He looked like see was surviving winter quite nicely. I think the hunting is easier when there's not a lot of snow (this photo is from a couple of years ago). Heard the sound of a snow plow. It sounded like it was right outside our window. Actually it was way up the hill on the other side of the road. Sound is accentuated in the winter. Sound from colder layers is refracted off warmer layers overhead, and carries further because of that. Thank you Google.

winds

Woke up to the full moon the "Wolf" moon shining through the bedroom window. Yesterday was day two of the January thaw. Roads were covered with water, the snow is gone, people washing their cars. The wind from the south blew hard all night long.

The winds which passed over my dwelling were such as sweep over the ridges of mountains bearing the broken strains, or celestial parts only, of terrestrial music. The morning wind forever blows, the poem of creation is uninterrupted, but few are the ears that hear it.

Walden
Henry David Thoreau

January thaw

Today through February 20th has always been mid-winter to me. Yesterday we had the beginnings of a January thaw. We'll take it.

cabin fever, part 1

"Say, old timer, it's beautiful up here in Vermont in the summer. But what do you do in the winter?"

"We set and think, mostly set."
Keith Jennison

winter

Hauling out the gloves, caps, and neck warmers. Sound of the snow plow, and snow crunching underfoot. Smell of wood smoke.

Mind of Winter

Six below zero this morning.

The Snowman

by Wallace Stevens

One must have a mind of winter

To regard the frost and the boughs

Of the pine-trees crusted with snow;

And have been cold a long time

To behold the junipers shagged with ice,

The spruces rough in the distant glitter

Of the January sun; and not to think

Of any misery in the sound of the wind,

In the sound of a few leaves,

Which is the sound of the land

Full of the same wind

That is blowing in the same bare place

For the listener, who listens in the snow,

And, nothing himself beholds

Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is.

wood stove

During most of the year, the wood stove is just a piece of iron in the kitchen. Often, miscellaneous items get left on the griddle. In the depths of winter, however, the stove is the center of the house. Wood heat is so comforting.

l'heure bleue

Take a winter with snow on the ground, a clear sky, and mix in just a hint of sunrise (or the last light of sunset), and this is what you get. The French call it l'heure bleue, the blue hour. What color is snow, really?

alive

Canada geese waiting it out on the Otter Creek. There was at least 100 of them. I drive by this spot frequently. Sometimes they're there, sometimes they're not. It was so interesting to see that as I approached them for this photo, as a got to about 100 yards from them, they began to move away. Life is much more uncertain for geese than it is for us in some ways. They are very careful with their lives.

I am alive. I am here. I am trying. That is enough.
Dele Olanubi
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