T minus 6 and counting

Today, at a minimum, I’m grateful I don’t live anywhere near Buffalo, NY: up to 5 feet of snow coming down at 3 inches per hour? That even beats a Halloween blizzard.

There are patches of blue sky showing and an occasional splash of something that might be sunshine which  is a vast improvement over gray, cloud-covered skies day after day. Hope lives in the prospect of above freezing temperatures next week. Joni Mitchell’s lyrics from Big Yellow Taxi:

“Don't it always seem to go 
That you don't know what you've got 
Till it's gone” 

nicely reflect the absence of sunshine and seasonal temperatures for the past week or so. If this were January, I’d be grateful that the weather wasn’t worse. Context is sometimes very important when it comes to gratitude. Remember the joke about the man banging his head against a brick wall? When asked why he was doing that he replied “Because it feels so good when I stop.”

November, December: our cloudiest months?

Photo by J. Harrington

I’ve run into a bit of a similar problem. Yesterday was Minnesota’s Give to the Max day. I did my best to not support any of the pleas for a matching donation. I had already made a number of donations during the previous week, and will probably make a few more before month’s end. But I found participation in the GiveMN zoo that was yesterday to be unrewarding and unsatisfactory. On a bad day I get the impression that making almost any charitable donation get’s one’s name on a “sucker’s list” and email and snail mail requests for funds become intolerable. I think there’s a folk tale about killing the goose that laid the golden egg. That’s how I’m feeling about the abundance of requests to donate, leave a bequest, create a trust fund or make automatic monthly donations. I’ve had enough and I’ll be grateful if nonprofit folks begin to realize incessant requests can be counterproductive, although our dogs seem unwilling to accept that assessment when it comes to asking for treats or trips outside.

To Frighten a Storm

By Gladys Cardiff

O now you come in rut,

in rank and black desire,

to beat the brush, to lash

the wind with your long hair.

Ha! I am afraid,

exceedingly afraid.

But see? her path goes there,

along the swaying tops

of trees, up to the hills.

Too long she is alone.

Bypass our fields, and mount

your ravages of fire

and rain on higher trails.

You shall have her lying down

upon the smoking mountains.

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