Let it snow ...

It's snowing. We've had a couple of flurries since the beginning of January, but no significant snow at all since early December. To judge by the coverage on television, this is an EVENT. I'm sitting here with Crow, sipping a cup of coffee. Well, I'm sipping a cup of coffee. She's curled up beside me, completely content after a romp in the snow, and satisfied that the No Fly Zone has been cleared of intruders. I don't have the heart to tell her that the results of her efforts are temporary. The chickadee scouts announce her departure as soon as she turns her head. By the time she's completely turned away, they're all back at the feeders. The first picture shows the birds at the feeders; the second shows the area immediately after having been cleared by my two Enforcers of the Rules (note how they divide and conquer.)


























Crow continues to be Crow. Even out in the snow, while Hudson is off romping by himself, throwing himself into aerial 180s, snatching up huge mouthsful of snow and tossing them into the air like snowballs so he can catch them, she is right beside me, wondering what we're going to do next. As irritating as it is to have to stop before every shovelful of snow to ask her to please move, it is also deeply, deeply gratifying to look down and see her beautiful face looking up at me, always questioning "what's next, Mom?" Whatever I do, I never do it alone, for from Crow's perspective, everything we do, we do together.

If the power stays on, I'll actually enjoy this storm. I have everything I need. I did my grocery shopping on Thursday evening. I bought dog food last weekend. Yesterday, on the way home from the barn, I stopped at Hoffman's Feed in Long Valley and bought supplies of parrot and cockatiel food. Then I stopped at Pet Valu (why would any company choose to misspell a word to form a name? Have they no pride?) and picked up my favorite wild bird seed mix. I filled the feeders when I got home. This morning, the Blackcapped Chickadees, Nuthatches, Junkos, Cardinals, and even the Starlings made me glad I did. When the Hairy Woodpecker appeared for a short while, my sense of having "done something good" tripled.

There's a quiet in the town this morning that lends, for some reason, a sense of timelessness. Somewhere, among the papers I was given by the woman from whom I bought this house, there's a picture looking down Main Street, taken on a snowy morning in the early days of the 20th century. I'll have to dig it out and scan it. Looking out the front door from my kitchen this morning, looking down Main Street I find it would seem just as reasonable to suddenly see a horse-drawn sleigh coming toward me as it does to see one of the town's large trucks pushing a snow plow.

This will do for a February morning. I'll take this quiet, this sudden cancelation of plans. Mom will be 80 on Wednesday. Mark and Joannie and I were going to bring her a birthday party today. It will wait.

Though there is certainly someone with whom I'd love to share a morning like this, I find I am fine with being here by myself with my dogs and my birds. The coffee is hot. The first of the shoveling is done. I have some knitting I've been working on. There is a book on my nightstand for which I've had little time or energy. I've heard it said it takes four seasons in a house to make it a home. It may be that I am three seasons through to finally making this my home.