Juncos foraging in the yard are puffed up twice as round as usual. The way we describe extreme weather: why not a heat snap, a cold wave?
2017
12/30/2017
Snowstorm. A cardinal sits atop a small tree, his red plumage almost glowing among the white branches. Two woodpeckers tap in and of sync.
12/29/2017
Steady snow from clouds thin enough for the sun to glimmer though. My pants legs are flecked with flakes small and round as grains of salt.
12/28/2017
I can hear a titmouse tapping at a sunflower seed 100 feet away. A truck drives up the unplowed road—the squeak of the snow under its tires.
12/27/2017
Snow falling from an almost clear sky: scintillations small as pin-pricks drifting on the icy breeze. The crisp chirps of foraging juncos.
12/26/2017
Sun-glare on the snow; a bitter wind. A crow mob up on the ridge disperses, only to return a half hour later to whatever they’re tormenting.
12/25/2017
Christmas has come like a vengeful spirit, roaring on the ridgetop, plastering the weather sides of trees with snow. A Carolina wren’s song.
12/24/2017
Sun through cloud—enough to make the leaf duff shine in the woods. A chipmunk rustles. The distant squeal of a misaligned wheel on a train.
12/23/2017
Steady rain. The fog retreats 100 yards up the hillside without seeming to move, trees like a flash mob suddenly emerging from anonymity.
12/22/2017
The neighbor’s rooster crows a few times and falls silent, as if appalled by the gloom. Even a chickadee manages to sound querulous.
12/21/2017
Clear and very still. Frost’s fine needlework on the dead grass in front of the springhouse, where a wren keeps up an agitated chirping.
12/20/2017
Colder, with a brisk wind. The forest has developed a new creak, somewhere in the vicinity of the cloud-shrouded sun. It squeaks. It moans.
12/19/2017
The snow nearly vanished overnight, and the bare patches of moss are shockingly green. The pines sigh and whisper like strangers at a party.
12/18/2017
One degree above freezing and the hillside echoes with traffic noise. Meltwater drips from the roof, polyrhythms going in and out of sync.