Nature always bats last!

In our neighborhood, today marks the start of a January thaw. The temperature has climbed above 32℉. It did that yesterday in The Cities (Minneapolis / St. Paul) due, I believe, to their urban heat island. What little snow was left on the deck is almost gone. Sometime in the next few days we’ll take a crack at starting the tractor and seeing if the back blade can be lifted from the frozen ground. I forgot to put a block under the blade when last I parked the tractor and having it available to plow snow increases the likelihood we won’t get much.

The persistent cloud cover may obscure Thursday’s full moon, called the Great Spirit Moon by the Ojibwe and the Hard Times Moon by the Lakota. There was a break in the clouds last night and an almost full moon brightly lit the snow covered back yard. Remember, from that famous visit, “the moon on the crest of the new fallen snow, gave a luster of midday... ?” Come February 4, we’ll have reached the midpoint of winter and from there, technically, will be on our way out. Meteorologically, that may or may not be the case. We’ll see.

Christmas 2023 -- rain

Photo by J. Harrington

To remind you of what a strange winter it’s been around here, the picture above was taken on Christmas. Yes, those are raindrops on the trees, -- in Minnesota, -- at Christmas!! Meanwhile, world governments continue to putz around instead of taking a coordinated, cooperative approach to minimizing greenhouse gas emissions and adapting to the climate changes we’ll be faced with for the next century or more.

If we don’t get a lot of snow, or rain, over the next several weeks, spring flows in local trout streams will probably be less than normal due to lack of snowmelt runoff. I don’t want to speculate about the rest of the  fishing season, since I’m trying to become more optimistic. Voting for Republicans who will focus on denying the existence or the seriousness of climate breakdown should only be done by those who have no descendants, don’t expect to have any, and don’t give a damn about the rest of US.

Let Them Not Say

Jane Hirshfield
1953 – 

Let them not say:   we did not see it.
We saw.

Let them not say:   we did not hear it.
We heard.

Let them not say:     they did not taste it.
We ate, we trembled.

Let them not say:   it was not spoken, not written.
We spoke,
we witnessed with voices and hands.

Let them not say:     they did nothing.
We did not-enough.

Let them say, as they must say something: 

A kerosene beauty.
It burned.

Let them say we warmed ourselves by it,
read by its light, praised,
and it burned.

—2014

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