Blizzard !

Mon-

“Historic Blizzard” already starting to lay fresh powder on top of the remnants of the storm of a few days ago.  I’m somewhat jaded _ it seems that “historic” means anything that 25 to 30 year old meteorologists cannot personally remember.   But a few feet is very inconvenient for everyone and dangerous for some, and an old retired gent who can sit at home and watch the world turn white has no right to comment on such things.

My guess is that ten years from now, this will not be remembered.  With global warming the various storms and precipitation patterns are inevitably growing more intense.  If I were a betting man, I’d probably predict “historic” weather events almost every year, each dwarfing in magnitude what we all used to consider normal back in the good old days of the 1950’s.
Tue-

Early preliminary to major snowfall, wind picking up, moderate flakes off and on blurring the horizon.  After dark, the wind picked up and this morning about 15 inches on the ground.  Nothing too spectacular, as indicated by the second picture. 

Some claim this shows the power of nature.  500 years ago, the power of nature had already winnowed local tribes to the hardiest young, and a storm like this would lead to death by freezing and starvation.  300 years ago, early settlers would be trapped in cabins for long periods, also worried about cold and hunger.  150 years ago, the farming community would be relatively safe, but necessary outdoor tasks still risked mortal danger and frostbite.  Today  we worry overly about missing a few comforts _ instant transportation, power and connectivity _ as if they were of the same degree.  Nature has lost its bite in most of these local events, but may be avenging itself more long term with warming beginning to destroy the biosphere as we know it.
Wed-

Nowadays, being snowbound is a romantic state of mind.  Just about anyone can get out of anywhere _ even if it takes a helicopter _ if necessary.  Yet it can be a pleasant illusion for those with the necessary time.  Deep snow, frigid cold, harsh wind, long thick icicles _ things people are unlikely to find in a future of underground malls or interstellar spacecraft. 
 

I get just as much caught up in the cultural moods as anyone else.  There is always an edge of disaster, a rush of newness, hopes and fears and jumbles of experiences overloading each day.  Even meditative moments have trouble quelling the tide.  Sometimes nature can help slow me down a little, and this is such a moment.
Thu -

Not much to say about an expanse of snow.  Nothing very dramatic.  Warming ocean waters still resist any kind of permanent freeze in spite of low temperatures for the last few weeks.

I make myself go out and walk around a little, although my toes chill even through three pairs of socks.  What stops me from normal activity in the winter is not the cold, but the lack of shoulder on the roads.  It’s hard enough watching out for my own missteps, but sharing a narrowed icy road with maniacs who must get somewhere can be suicidal.
Fri-

Light snow has covered the world in beauty.  Softly luminous light envelops harmonious whites and greys tinged with soft brown, accented by peeks of dark green.  Flakes continue to fall, there is no time but now, nothing to do but enjoy the show.

I sit quietly in contemplation sipping coffee, adjusting my mood to match the scenery.  Not difficult for me today, I am fortunate in having nothing of the jangling outside world intruding on my peaceful solitude.  A lovely blessing this morning, something to truly appreciate and be thankful for.

Sat-

For all the trouble caused by a foot and a half of snow, its results are singularly unimpressive along the shoreline.  Wind and cold are far more brutal than slush and the remnants of ice washed by tide.  Fish, I am sure, noticed nothing at all.

Beautiful scene for a modern person who need not be concerned with the trivialities of having enough to eat, a cozy place to sleep.  Were I to properly use the miracles daily provided by civilization and science, I could bask in such experience all the time.
Sun-

Nobody going swimming here today.  But tonight we shall be in Florida, where at least the sand is visible.  Miracles of modern science, jet planes, even as they add to global warming.  Would us not taking this one trip a year make a difference?  I suspect not.

We go a little north of Miami, where children are as rare as unicorns.  It’s mostly grumpy older well-off people, a sprinkling of younger burn-outs, and various young-adult menials who must do wealth’s bidding.  Affection has been almost totally transferred, it seems, to dogs in various shapes and sizes.  For me, an excursion to an exotic culture in a very strange land.

 

Still Winter

Mon-

Heavy rain over the weekend washed away most of the residual snow and ice from last week.  Woods have nothing dramatic left, just brown leaves, dull ivy, darkened birch _ even the bright green holly is subdued in the bright overcast.  Another day passes, and suddenly we are past mid January.  Days are already notably longer.

An easy time to be snug and immobile indoors.  Being outside is often a challenge, from bitter cold to freezing rain to snow and ice making walking all but impossible.  And what are the rewards _ no flowers, few birds,  shades of brown?  Yet entering the elements has rewards, if I can just get beyond that storm door.
Tue-

Tangled bare fallen seasons gone

Skies hover colored as the waters

Nothing memorable

Unless I try
Wed-

Centerport Harbor unusually empty in a frigid north wind.  An enterprising clammer takes advantage of that natural resource to use sails to help him drag rakes along the bottom for harvest.  Tough way to make a living, but it does keep you out of fluorescent light hell.

About the only thing I miss from other eras is the lack of open spaces free of people.  Around here, especially, every inch of ground is covered and coveted.  Fortunately we do have parks, most importantly these parks on open water, where I can pretend to be alone for a while.  I don’t know if my periodic desire for solitude is a grace or a fault, but I know I must allow it once in a while for my mental balance.

On lonely trail above blue sea,

Weeds stiffly brown, bare frozen sand,

No birds, no deer, just barren trees,

Empty mind, no thoughts, no plans.
Fri-

This scene will soon change as a new probably ugly steel and glass hotel is stuck onto the façade of the old town hall.   Meanwhile, just below, a movie set is seeking to utilize some of the quaint historic charm of the village.  I’d go for keeping the historic charm, but all the town elders ever think about (because that is the nature of ambitious people) is to raze the ancient and get more money (presumably) from the new.

Oh, it’s sad enough that no one around here even thinks about what they call “patrimony” in Europe.  Admittedly, ours is only a few centuries, and hardly spectacular, but it is real.  At least I have had a chance to see much of it, to meditate on the meaning of time’s passage, and to enjoy fully the world I have inhabited.
Sat-

Warming waters from the Atlantic have prevented much freeze this year _ even this ice is just from fresh water seepage floating on top of the brine.  What little we have is quite pretty, on a cold clear morning.

The invasive phragmite reeds, which everyone hates, float prettily overhead.  The spartina, which everyone wants to thrive, struggles with the polluted waters.  Yet in China, apparently, it is the spartina which is the hated invader, displacing native grasses quite as aggressively as phragmite here.  As a pretty awful invasive species myself, I can sympathize with everyone and everything.
Sun-

Usually these pictures come from my walk in the morning, or at least somewhere outside.  But sometimes I do get very lazy, when it is, for example, drizzling coldly on heavy wet snow.  So it’s just a poor picture out our window, not even bothering to throw on a coat and boots and tramp around a little.  Mea culpa.

Any discipline, writing or art included, is an exercise in setting boundaries.  What are you willing to use, what do you want to leave out.  Will a picture use advanced techniques or just be by design a crude point and click?  Will an essay seek the exact mot juste, or simply express a flow of thoughts at a given moment?  Lurking behind the technique is the reason, but choosing the technique is a larger part of the rationale than we often acknowledge.

 

 

Postfestival Blues

Mon-

Parts of the harbor finally succumb to deep cold with a skimming of ice.  The warm water has been very resistant this year,  these floating patches the first sign of freeze.  Even so, only the upper fresh water layer is affected _ out near the inlet the salt water looks like mid July.

Most lights have been taken down, most decorations put away.  All guests have gone home.  Daily routines have resumed in all their dull glory.  The party is over, even the hangover the party is over, and now the hard wait for spring truly begins.  An easy time to ignore, to hide from, to try to forget.  And yet _ as always _ there is deep beauty in the always fresh scenes each morning, loveliness in the rich colors of southern sunset.
Tue-

Hushed frozen wind
Words thoughts fail

Wonder or infirmity of age?

Answers slide vague as air
Wed-

This bay into Lloyd Neck lies beyond the harbor inlet, and the waters out here are slightly more frigid and unpolluted.  A freeze can almost resemble “the good old days” when everything _ even Long Island Sound itself _ would occasionally ice over in the more normally harsh winters.

On the one hand, I regret those times have passed.  For one reason or another, the waters run free almost all year, every year.   There is a worry about what that may mean.  But, on the other hand, I only have today to enjoy it all anyway.  What reason have I to be troubled of past and future?  Things will change _ they always do _ and whoever is around then will have to adapt and enjoy whatever there is, as I have done with what has been around now.
Thu-

By necessity or choice

Some people must perform

Tasks alone and difficult

While I try to stay warm

Fri-

A dock in Northport village could be Maine, gulls and all.  Northport is known to be picturesque, but many of the commercial photographs concentrate on summer evenings.  The iced harbor hosts a wind that bites to the bone and sucks heat out no matter how warmly dressed you are.

Yet there is a clear channel in the middle of the harbor, where working boats continue to go in and out as long as the ice remains thin enough.   I suppose those folks are extremely proud of how hardy they are _ I would be.  Nevertheless, I’m always amazed that in this day and age people can still be found to do such tough and difficult and presumably nasty work.

Sat-

Irresistible force of the tide meets unmovable object of the rocks and the loser is _ the ice.   Here are all the elements of a good tale or proverb, not excepting the dead reeds that will eventually return no matter what and the encroaching works of man destined for eventual dust. 

Proverbs and tales and thoughts of irresistible and immovable are plentiful and comforting.  They all lie.  The world is all relative and contradictory and complex and there are no absolutes.  Deeper cold for longer and glaciers would halt the tides and move the rocks.  Desperate heat for longer would remove the reeds and eventually the people.  Goldilocks environment is in delicate balance, for which the only appropriate tale is one of worry.
Sun-

 

Imagine how strange a scene like this would look to some primitive from the tropics who had never known snow or ice.  Even for me, the sharp shadows and reflections can make it resemble some setting from a science fiction movie on another planet.  Yet it is part of all the “normal” taken for granted every day.

One of the hardest tasks I find, in a world of electronic distractions, is to maintain a sense of wonder at the “ordinary.”   I become dulled by the repetition of moments, and forget how precious each one is.  I set out strenuously looking for something wonderful, when wonderful is everywhere I wish to concentrate my being.

  

 

Renewed Joy

Mon-

By convention, seasons begin another annual cycle, just like the last one, but subtly different.  So also with the views and daily thoughts in my blog, each very much like each other, like all the others last year, yet each subtly charged, never quite repeating.  So, of course, each moment of my life.

I notice no difference in myself.  Yet almost all my cells, in the solar revolution past, have been replaced one or several times.  Some memories _ what I ate for breakfast in September _ are irretrievably gone, but others such as a summer wedding are deeply etched in memory.  Mysterious, incomprehensible, contradictory, awesome.  I try to great each joyous moment of existence with the respect it deserves.
Tue-

North wind whips

Whitecaps rushing on
While calm geese shelter all day

Old man remembers.

Wed-

Light snow drifts into a quite cold morning.  Only I see these outlined branches against the farther waters.  Dogs and their masters are waiting for better times, not yet desperate enough to brave these minor elements when they have just had the holidays to run around outside as much as they want.

As always, I carry mood within myself, although that is sometimes hard to accept.  The deep chill of short winter days seems made for depression, but it is just as beautiful as summer.  In any case, all my universe and how I seek to appreciate it lies behind these eyes, under my cap, almost immune to the physical world.
Thu-

What marvels seen, such wonders come,

In passing night, each risen sun.
_Karma Save_
Fri-

In spite of 5 degree temperatures, the water is too warm to even skim over yet.  Light snow refuses to melt, mud from recent rain has frozen into the consistency of steel.   A brisk wind rapidly bruises exposed skin, even taking a deep breath can be an adventure.

But the good side of all this is that I have the whole place to myself.  Even the cars are infrequent.  No dogs, no joggers, not even my casual normal fellow walkers.  I can enjoy the peace and quiet, listening to birds and the rustle of the trees.  I rarely notice how antisocial I am until I have the happiness of such moments.
Sat-

Preening feathers, swan said “Behold how lovely am I, the most noble of waterfowl.”

Goose said “Yeah but you can’t do anything except drift.  We take over entire fields, and can migrate incredible distances.”

Duck said  “You never do, though.  I’m the only one around here that has to work for a living.”

“Poor birds,” old man said, turning away, “too stupid to know that I am the glory of the universe.”
Sun-

Haven’t had much snow this year in spite of frigid temperatures lately.  These two inches are about it.  An appropriate blanket of forgetfulness marking the true end of another year gone.

I struggle with the recognition that I am useless and irrelevant.  I no longer share an illusion that I can affect the world.  It is important that I remain true to my culture and my time of life by appreciating it fully.  In all the infinite history of the universe, there has never been anyone like me, and never will be again.