The Snow
There was a storm here all day and night leaving around 3 feet of fluffy white snow. I've shoveled the back deck once and will need to again just to let the dogs out. When they do, the snow is up past Bella's shoulders. It's a monotone world of white, deep forest green, and subtle touches of crab apple red and golden birch ochre. As I write, the sun is coming up from the south east and rimming the sky in baby pink and blue, blazing our neighbor's firs in gold.
It's quiet here except for the male cardinal, with no one else to challenge for his territory, he's taking on his own reflection in the garage windows. A piece of cardboard handily protects him from himself. By the back window the feeders have acquired snowy hats looking like the hats from the children's book of long ago "Hats for Sale". As I open the window to clear them off and add more food, the snow spills into the house, crystal cold on my bare feet. The 'dees, nuthatches, winter plumed goldfinches and more tiny ones quickly fly in grateful for the breakfast.
We've taken to watching an old TV show at night on Amazon Prime, "Murder She Wrote". The timing may be slow, but it checks off boxes on both our lists: no violence for me, intrigue for Jim. I like recognizing and then looking up the old actors. Some young ones surprisingly gone now while others, "golden oldies", are still performing. In the last two years of Mom's and Dad's lives we did the same, only then the show was set in Vermont but not really "Newhart".
Jim fell asleep on the third one and when I gently woke him to go upstairs, he had this beautiful smile illuminating his face. He told me that earlier in the day he had been cleaning off the memory card from a camera he is meaning to give away and it had the most beautiful pictures of me.
Love is a tricky thing because if one is as fortunate as Jim and I have been, inevitably one of us will "walk the other home". I'm doing my best to stay in the moment and not let these moments go but sometimes I can't help but be overwhelmed by gratitude for what we have, who he is, and what, like the gently melting snow, will disappear. Morning, when it is quiet and quite beautiful like this, is a good time to cry.
It's quiet here except for the male cardinal, with no one else to challenge for his territory, he's taking on his own reflection in the garage windows. A piece of cardboard handily protects him from himself. By the back window the feeders have acquired snowy hats looking like the hats from the children's book of long ago "Hats for Sale". As I open the window to clear them off and add more food, the snow spills into the house, crystal cold on my bare feet. The 'dees, nuthatches, winter plumed goldfinches and more tiny ones quickly fly in grateful for the breakfast.
We've taken to watching an old TV show at night on Amazon Prime, "Murder She Wrote". The timing may be slow, but it checks off boxes on both our lists: no violence for me, intrigue for Jim. I like recognizing and then looking up the old actors. Some young ones surprisingly gone now while others, "golden oldies", are still performing. In the last two years of Mom's and Dad's lives we did the same, only then the show was set in Vermont but not really "Newhart".
Jim fell asleep on the third one and when I gently woke him to go upstairs, he had this beautiful smile illuminating his face. He told me that earlier in the day he had been cleaning off the memory card from a camera he is meaning to give away and it had the most beautiful pictures of me.
Love is a tricky thing because if one is as fortunate as Jim and I have been, inevitably one of us will "walk the other home". I'm doing my best to stay in the moment and not let these moments go but sometimes I can't help but be overwhelmed by gratitude for what we have, who he is, and what, like the gently melting snow, will disappear. Morning, when it is quiet and quite beautiful like this, is a good time to cry.
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