This new normal doesn’t seem normal

Trust me, I’m NOT complaining about the lack of snow, but it does leave the back yard and the countryside looking shopworn. Another day of cloudy skies doesn’t help. To prove that you can believe I’m NOT complaining, yesterday I fired up the snow blower to be ready, just in case. It went fine.

With what passes for normal weather patterns disrupted for now, I’m noting that the daily highs and lows are what is usually considered good for maple syruping (lows mid 20’s, highs mid 40’s), most years that happens next month. I wonder if this may catch some folks with their syruping buckets down. I’ll keep my eyes open as I wander through the countryside over the next week or so.

barred owl: winter visitor

Photo by J. Harrington

Two years ago we were visited by a barred owl in early February. No sign of any so far this year. Maybe some day soon we’ll at least get to hear a pair calling to each other as part of a mating ritual and I’m not giving up hope of a sighting since many of them have been in March.

I don’t know about you, but I definitely needed a push out of my mechanistic routine into a more organic pattern, I do believe we’ve got one with little sense of what comes next. Good luck to US.

Snowy Night 

by Mary Oliver

Last night, an owl
in the blue dark
tossed
an indeterminate number
of carefully shaped sounds into
the world, in which, 
a quarter of a mile away, I happened
to be standing.
I couldn’t tell
which one it was –
the barred or the great-horned
ship of the air –
it was that distant. But, anyway, 
aren’t there moments
that are better than knowing something, 
and sweeter? Snow was falling, 
so much like stars
filling the dark trees
that one could easily imagine
its reason for being was nothing more
than prettiness. I suppose
if this were someone else’s story
they would have insisted on knowing
whatever is knowable – would have hurried
over the fields
to name it – the owl, I mean.
But it’s mine, this poem of the night, 
and I just stood there, listening and holding out
my hands to the soft glitter
falling through the air. I love this world, 
but not for its answers.
And I wish good luck to the owl, 
whatever its name –
and I wish great welcome to the snow, 
whatever its severe and comfortless
and beautiful meaning. 

********************************************
Thanks for visiting. Come again when you can.
Please be kind to each other while you can.