Red as a winter color

I think this year the Christmas amaryllis will come into bloom for next year’s Valentine’s Day, or thereabouts. I believe we missed the timing on the cool to cold dark period of rest needed to support the December flowers. Instead, the Better Half cleverly ordered bunches of holly from Oregon, the kind with real red berries that we have to be sure the dogs don’t eat. The place looks downright festive and it will be fun to see how close to Valentine’s the amaryllis blooms. One of my longstanding frustrations with Minnesota is that much of the state, including where  we live, is borderline or worse for holly plants. Winterberry just isn’t the same.

sometimes, Christmas brings amaryllis blooms

Photo by J. Harrington

Weather permitting (heh, heh), tomorrow afternoon I’ll use the rear blade on the tractor to clear much of the accumulated precipitation from the drive. I don’t think I can drag the trash and recycling cans through the township snow plow’s leavings at the end of the driveway and, with luck, the slop will still be soft enough to move tomorrow afternoon. We might even need to take another snow removal run Friday before it gets really cold. Some of us think we’d be much  better off if the intermittent drought concentrated in the winter months and left spring and summer precipitation alone.

There are still some odds and ends of holiday shopping to get finished, and coordination on who’s getting  what for whom on which list, complicated, a little, because our son’s birthday is also December 25 and Christmas presents must be distinguished from birthday presents. Unless there’s a radical shift in the weather trend, December 25 looks like it will be sunny and very cold. One of my Christmas wishes is that it be sunny and not too cold.

Amaryllis

By Connie Wanek

A flower needs to be this size 

to conceal the winter window, 

and this color, the red 

of a Fiat with the top down, 

to impress us, dull as we've grown. 

Months ago the gigantic onion of a bulb 

half above the soil 

stuck out its green tongue 

and slowly, day by day, 

the flower itself entered our world, 

closed, like hands that captured a moth, 

then open, as eyes open, 

and the amaryllis, seeing us, 

was somehow undiscouraged. 

It stands before us now 

as we eat our soup; 

you pour a little of your drinking water 

into its saucer, and a few crumbs 

of fragrant earth fall 

onto the tabletop. 

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Animals at Christmas

The Winter Solstice is a week from tomorrow. With luck, the impending storm will be over by then. My smartphone’s weather app forecasts high temperatures in the single digits come the astronomical beginning of winter. The rain--snow mix for several days, followed by rapidly dropping temperatures down around zero, will be annoying and aggravating for many of us humans. It may well be life-threatening for local wildlife. We’ll keep the feeder filled and the suet looks good for at least a few days.

female and male cardinal

Photo by J. Harrington

You probably know that snow has insulating qualities that freezing rain doesn’t. The critters that are in various forms of hibernation will probably be less troubled by the unseasonable precipitation pattern than those that are active year round. For example, I’m set up to blow snow but not to melt an ice-covered driveway. Maybe it’s not too late to ask Santa for a flamethrower for Christmas.

In the 25 years plus that we’ve lived here, this is the first winter I’ve seen pocket gopher mounds develop in December and emerge through the snow cover. Climate change? Probably. I just can’t work up the energy to dig through mostly frozen ground to set traps though.

Meanwhile, the pileated woodpecker we mentioned the other day is back. This time s/he (haven’t got a good look yet) perched on the deck railing and leaned toward the feeder ports. It looked like this might have been a successful tactic, but s/he still hasn’t tried the suet feeder. I don’t get it!

If you remember the biblical stories of the first Christmas, animals, mostly domestic, played their own roles. Later, the reindeer helped Santa get around to deliver presents. And how many animals are mentioned in the Twelve Days of Christmas?

The Oxen

By Thomas Hardy

Christmas Eve, and twelve of the clock.

“Now they are all on their knees,”

An elder said as we sat in a flock

By the embers in hearthside ease.

We pictured the meek mild creatures where

They dwelt in their strawy pen,

Nor did it occur to one of us there

To doubt they were kneeling then.

So fair a fancy few would weave

In these years! Yet, I feel,

If someone said on Christmas Eve,

“Come; see the oxen kneel,

“In the lonely barton by yonder coomb

Our childhood used to know,”

I should go with him in the gloom,

Hoping it might be so.

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