Long johns on the first of June! 41F/5C. And the sun already in the treetops with the goldfinches.
cold
5/31/2024
Cold and crystal-clear. Sound is out of the east, where the quarry machines grind, giving the rising sun an industrial soundtrack.
5/30/2024
Unseasonably cool. When the sun comes out, I can see that the breeze is freighted with bits of down and other plant parts—all the detritus of blooms and booms.
3/21/2024
Unseasonably cold, with the sun so bright and air so clear, the few clouds seem lost, like guests at the wrong party. Leathery old mountain laurel leaves look fresh and new.
3/11/2024
The ground is white again, and the trees sway like drunks as small orange clouds scud past. I sample the freezing air through a sunburnt nose.
2/15/2024
Very cold and still. The clear sky at dawn has gone white. Crows call to crows. The floorboards shiver when my furnace kicks on.
1/31/2024
Another gloomy dawn, a few degrees below freezing. The sound of an animal returning to its home under my house. Standing up to look, I tip over my mug, and stare at the small puddle of tea as whatever it is has a brief gnaw on a foundation beam.
1/21/2024
I’m grateful to the snowflakes for mostly not landing on the pages of my book and sailing on by. Am I fully acclimated to the winter now? It’s disconcerting how much the darkness has receded, only a month past the solstice.
1/20/2024
Deep cold. The sound of wind mingling with the dull howl of distant jets. Two dead leaves pick this moment to finally let go and twirl up through their small oak into the clouds.
1/17/2024
Five degrees and breezy. The creek still gurgles, low and slow, with Venus through the trees flickering like a candle in the wind.
1/15/2024
7F/-14C at dawn. The rifle-crack of a tree with ice in its heartwood. I peer like some ancient mummy through my layers of cloth.
1/3/2024
After another cold, windy night, might the ground finally be frozen? A tree wails in the darkness. From the ridgetop, long sighs.
1/2/2024
An icy breeze curls around the house and makes the big dial thermometer squeak and moan against the wall: five degrees below freezing. The whistle of a mourning dove’s wings.
12/20/2023
Clear as a bell and cold as a well, notwithstanding which the brown mountain is beginning to show through its thin blanket of snow.