Sometimes in Winter...
Finally time to pause and take a deep breath or two or--hell--even enjoy the holidays.
I finally gave up hope that my stamps-on-line order would arrive in time to mail out my holiday cards and went to the PO and bought some stamps so I could get those suckers in the mail Tuesday. (Of course, I *knew* this meant my stamps would arrive the very next day but f*ck it--I needed to mail the cards Tuesday and now I am older/wiser about the whole stamps-on-line thing. What WAS I thinking?) So, I'll have an abundance of holiday stamps and be paying my bills with them well into next year. Serves me right.
It was snowing when I came out of the Post Office. It had been overcast all day and the clouds had a dark gray cast that promised precipitation, but still, it was an unexpected beauty.
It was 45 degrees and wet yesterday. It has been very, very windy since Tuesday night--they had gusts over 100 kts on the Anchorage hillside Tuesday night and I am sure the wind hit fifty several times last night at our place. Even down at the airport it has been steady between twenty and thirty knots most of the day. Temperatures have dropped steadily since last night (our high temperature reading for today was right after midnight at 46 degrees) and now it is twenty at 8 pm. There is a fine, dry snow, like spindrift, in the fierce northerly wind but it won't amount to much. After yesterday, the deck was bare of snow and what was on the ground was compacted by warmth and rain to about eight-to-ten inches.
In the colder air this morning, dozens of little finches were feasting on the seed I threw out for them over the past few days. I miss the pine grosbeaks. It's been several years since there were any around here. I suppose the loss of our forest has altered their wintering places but their bell-like calls were always so cheering to hear.
I have been relaxing tonight. I need to catch up on my journaling but after rushing around the last week or so getting gifts wrapped and distributed and cards addressed and mailed, as well as doing all the things Denny wanted to accomplish--I just needed some kick-back time. Once again I haven't had the time to do the baking like I had wanted to do but we have plenty of cookies and goodies and a pumpkin pie. We aren't going to suffer through the darkest days of winter.
It feels decadent, after reading of the privations of the early arctic explorers, to be so flush with calories and variety of food. You rarely stop to think what a luxury an orange or tomato is in wintertime.
Tomorrow is the hundredth anniversary of my Grandma's birth--December 24th, 1904. Born on a Christmas Eve at the start of the twentieth century--what a time she lived to see!
I still think or her every day. I miss her. It is a sad, weary missing--not a sharp grief. I know that it is the way of things, that I had a generous amount of time with her. Destiny placed us too far apart in time for us to have all the time together that we wanted. Through me, through my memories of her, she will live into this century. For a while.
Sometimes in Winter
forgotten memories
remember you behind the trees
with leaves that cried
I finally gave up hope that my stamps-on-line order would arrive in time to mail out my holiday cards and went to the PO and bought some stamps so I could get those suckers in the mail Tuesday. (Of course, I *knew* this meant my stamps would arrive the very next day but f*ck it--I needed to mail the cards Tuesday and now I am older/wiser about the whole stamps-on-line thing. What WAS I thinking?) So, I'll have an abundance of holiday stamps and be paying my bills with them well into next year. Serves me right.
It was snowing when I came out of the Post Office. It had been overcast all day and the clouds had a dark gray cast that promised precipitation, but still, it was an unexpected beauty.
It was 45 degrees and wet yesterday. It has been very, very windy since Tuesday night--they had gusts over 100 kts on the Anchorage hillside Tuesday night and I am sure the wind hit fifty several times last night at our place. Even down at the airport it has been steady between twenty and thirty knots most of the day. Temperatures have dropped steadily since last night (our high temperature reading for today was right after midnight at 46 degrees) and now it is twenty at 8 pm. There is a fine, dry snow, like spindrift, in the fierce northerly wind but it won't amount to much. After yesterday, the deck was bare of snow and what was on the ground was compacted by warmth and rain to about eight-to-ten inches.
In the colder air this morning, dozens of little finches were feasting on the seed I threw out for them over the past few days. I miss the pine grosbeaks. It's been several years since there were any around here. I suppose the loss of our forest has altered their wintering places but their bell-like calls were always so cheering to hear.
I have been relaxing tonight. I need to catch up on my journaling but after rushing around the last week or so getting gifts wrapped and distributed and cards addressed and mailed, as well as doing all the things Denny wanted to accomplish--I just needed some kick-back time. Once again I haven't had the time to do the baking like I had wanted to do but we have plenty of cookies and goodies and a pumpkin pie. We aren't going to suffer through the darkest days of winter.
It feels decadent, after reading of the privations of the early arctic explorers, to be so flush with calories and variety of food. You rarely stop to think what a luxury an orange or tomato is in wintertime.
Tomorrow is the hundredth anniversary of my Grandma's birth--December 24th, 1904. Born on a Christmas Eve at the start of the twentieth century--what a time she lived to see!
I still think or her every day. I miss her. It is a sad, weary missing--not a sharp grief. I know that it is the way of things, that I had a generous amount of time with her. Destiny placed us too far apart in time for us to have all the time together that we wanted. Through me, through my memories of her, she will live into this century. For a while.
Sometimes in Winter
forgotten memories
remember you behind the trees
with leaves that cried
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