Seasonal change

Happy December 1st. We've made it to the last month of the year. and the beginning of meteorological Winter. Today has been a day of errands, Christmas activities and home repair chores. A major grocery shopping expedition was completed, involving both our local co-op and our local big box. Replacement parts for the downstairs vanity stopper were acquired at a home improvement big box where we also got a new faucet for the kitchen sink (hard water is tough on fixtures) and a holly bush. The vanity stopper has been repaired. The faucet will be tackled later this week. All in all we've had a busy day.

December's "cold sun"      © harrington

Did you see the "cold sun" this morning? It always looks so weird to me when the cloud cover steals all the warmth from the sun. In case you missed seeing it earlier, what I'm talking about is above, with a close(r) up below.

December's "cold sun" in close up   © harrington

I wonder if we'll have a different kind of cold sunlight by Friday when the day's high is supposed to be in single digits. Some of us are definitely not looking forward to that. Would a buffalo coat keep us warm or should it be left on the animal this winter?

The Buffalo Coat

By Thomas McGrath 

I see him moving, in his legendary fleece,

Between the superhighway and an Algonquin stone axe;

Between the wild tribes, in their lost heat,

And the dark blizzard of my Grandfather’s coat;

Cold with the outdoor cold caught in the curls,

Smelling of the world before the poll tax.

And between the new macadam and the Scalp Act

They got him by the short hair; had him clipped

Who once was wild—and all five senses wild—

Printing the wild with his hoof’s inflated script

Before the times was money in the bank,

Before it was a crime to be so mild.

But history is a fact, and moves on feet

Sharper than his, toward wallows deeper than.

And the myth that covered all his moving parts,

Grandfather’s time had turned into a coat;

And what kept warm then, in the true world’s cold

Is old and cold in a world his death began.