The party's over ...
Nov. 3rd, 2021 08:43 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
altivoLast night was the third night in a row that temperatures dipped below freezing. In fact, this morning it was 20°F when I got up at 5 am. We went out to feed horses, cats, and ducks at about 8 am and found a film (sometimes more) of ice on every water bucket, indoors or out. Indeed, the boys' outdoor watering trough had a thin glassy layer of hard ice covered with fallen leaves.
The catalpa trees around the house have been holding onto their leaves for dear life, but this was the last straw for them. The leaves are hanging like limp rags from the branches, and will likely all be on the ground by evening. This event for the catalpas is generally decisive and quick. Often I wake in the morning of a first hard frost to find that all their leaves that were still green and healthy the day before have already dropped to the ground. When I lived in Lansing, Michigan, I rented a small house with several very large catalpas in the front yard. When they jetisoned their leaves, the result was an entire yard knee deep with leaves and all at once. That means winter is imminent.
We will be swapping out ordinary buckets for electric heated ones today. Have to put the floating defroster into the boys' water trough as well. Make sure the duck house has plenty of good straw on the floor, increase the amount of wood shavings in the horses' stalls, make sure the woodpile in the garage is replenished if it is down (it may be OK for now) and clean out the woodstove. Before using that, I have to relocate all my string instruments (guitars, banjos, mandolin, ukuleles, violin) from where the cases have settled over the spring and summer. They are too close to the woodstove and its brick hearth and would be damaged for sure by the heat.
I'm not exactly complaining about any of this, though. Now that I don't have to get up before dawn in order to shower, eat, and start off my 15 mile commute to work in the dark and snow, I find that I don't mind winter nearly as much. Taking care of the animals in the cold is not exactly pleasant, but I love having them and they mostly appreciate what we do so it's worthwhile. (Reminder to self: Asher needs a new stall blanket for this cold weather. Have to order that.)
The truth is, I love having four distinct seasons in my year. The variety in weather and changes in the landscape are fascinating to me. I grew up with that in Michigan, and unlike most of my family, I'm not inclined to move to somewhere that has no clearly identifiable winter. In fact, to my younger brother's credit, I laud the decision by himself and my sister-in-law to build a retirement home in Michigan and live with the shifting seasons. They had spent time in Japan and several homes in the southeastern part of the US where the weather is somewhat milder during the years when he was in the Navy. They still decided to return to Michigan and to the area of Traverse City, where our grandparents last lived.
Here, on the wall behind the woodstove, we have four large ceramic plates depicting the four seasons. Those were painted and fired by my mother when she was taking ceramics classes about 40 years ago. She and my step-father retired to Florida not too many years later, but those plates still hung in her kitchen. Once when I was visiting them she asked if there was anything in the house that I wanted to keep after she was gone, and I asked for those plates. She laughed and said she would put my name on them. What actually happened though is that after Ted passed away, Mom decided to move to live with my older brother in Texas. He went to Florida and helped her pack up or dispose of her house contents and sell the house. And at that time, around 20 years ago, those plates showed up in the mail here, packed in pizza boxes. Fortunately, they survived the trip intact and are mine to cherish now.
They hang on the other side of the stove from my grandmother's cuckoo clock that I loved so much when I was a child. Granny gave that to me while she was still living, saying she couldn't keep it running any more and the local clock shop said they couldn't fix it. But years later, after she was long gone and it had lain in a box in a closet for all that time, my dear husband sneaked it off to a clock shop here in Illinois and they got it running again. I have to wind it twice a day (no eight day movement for that one, it's nearly a century old) but the clock and those plates keep my Mom and Granny alive in my memory still.
The catalpa trees around the house have been holding onto their leaves for dear life, but this was the last straw for them. The leaves are hanging like limp rags from the branches, and will likely all be on the ground by evening. This event for the catalpas is generally decisive and quick. Often I wake in the morning of a first hard frost to find that all their leaves that were still green and healthy the day before have already dropped to the ground. When I lived in Lansing, Michigan, I rented a small house with several very large catalpas in the front yard. When they jetisoned their leaves, the result was an entire yard knee deep with leaves and all at once. That means winter is imminent.
We will be swapping out ordinary buckets for electric heated ones today. Have to put the floating defroster into the boys' water trough as well. Make sure the duck house has plenty of good straw on the floor, increase the amount of wood shavings in the horses' stalls, make sure the woodpile in the garage is replenished if it is down (it may be OK for now) and clean out the woodstove. Before using that, I have to relocate all my string instruments (guitars, banjos, mandolin, ukuleles, violin) from where the cases have settled over the spring and summer. They are too close to the woodstove and its brick hearth and would be damaged for sure by the heat.
I'm not exactly complaining about any of this, though. Now that I don't have to get up before dawn in order to shower, eat, and start off my 15 mile commute to work in the dark and snow, I find that I don't mind winter nearly as much. Taking care of the animals in the cold is not exactly pleasant, but I love having them and they mostly appreciate what we do so it's worthwhile. (Reminder to self: Asher needs a new stall blanket for this cold weather. Have to order that.)
The truth is, I love having four distinct seasons in my year. The variety in weather and changes in the landscape are fascinating to me. I grew up with that in Michigan, and unlike most of my family, I'm not inclined to move to somewhere that has no clearly identifiable winter. In fact, to my younger brother's credit, I laud the decision by himself and my sister-in-law to build a retirement home in Michigan and live with the shifting seasons. They had spent time in Japan and several homes in the southeastern part of the US where the weather is somewhat milder during the years when he was in the Navy. They still decided to return to Michigan and to the area of Traverse City, where our grandparents last lived.
Here, on the wall behind the woodstove, we have four large ceramic plates depicting the four seasons. Those were painted and fired by my mother when she was taking ceramics classes about 40 years ago. She and my step-father retired to Florida not too many years later, but those plates still hung in her kitchen. Once when I was visiting them she asked if there was anything in the house that I wanted to keep after she was gone, and I asked for those plates. She laughed and said she would put my name on them. What actually happened though is that after Ted passed away, Mom decided to move to live with my older brother in Texas. He went to Florida and helped her pack up or dispose of her house contents and sell the house. And at that time, around 20 years ago, those plates showed up in the mail here, packed in pizza boxes. Fortunately, they survived the trip intact and are mine to cherish now.
They hang on the other side of the stove from my grandmother's cuckoo clock that I loved so much when I was a child. Granny gave that to me while she was still living, saying she couldn't keep it running any more and the local clock shop said they couldn't fix it. But years later, after she was long gone and it had lain in a box in a closet for all that time, my dear husband sneaked it off to a clock shop here in Illinois and they got it running again. I have to wind it twice a day (no eight day movement for that one, it's nearly a century old) but the clock and those plates keep my Mom and Granny alive in my memory still.
no subject
Date: 2021-11-04 03:35 am (UTC)In between we have a fall with lovely, if muted colors and temperatures that fall into "this is nice to live in". Of course sometimes fall is an extension of fire season, but not this year.
Winter. Winter is an amazing season with green grass, vibrant mosses and lichens, flowers bursting out (mostly manzanita that flowers Dec-Feb). By Feb the first annual flowers are peeking out. In March the first tree leaves appear, often in lovely pinks and pale greens. March has a whole progression of flowers and April is glorious. Flowers blanket the hills and fields.
Some years the hills are drying up the first week of May. Usually May is a reasonable month, there is water in the streams, the late spring early summer flowers begin blooming by mid-May or late May. The grasses go dry. The temperature climbs. June ushers in the hot season. Still the vegetation is full of juice and fire, while still a concern is less of one.
Gradually the ground dries out to the point it won't conduct electricity (just like your snow covered winter months). Plants become tinder dry. Most trees fade from their spring bright green to duller, more blue and grey. July fades into August. Wells and springs reduce their flow and fire season starts in earnest. Humans continue to turn on air conditioning when they can't stand the 100+ degree temperatures. Thankfully the humidity is low. Life revolves around mornings and evenings, not mid afternoon.
September grinds on into October. The oaks are turning yellow and red and the blue oaks are loosing their leaves as a protection against drought. Temperatures fall back into: "this is pleasant to live in". People like me itch to get the chainsaw out, but refrain because the countryside is still a tinder box. A few sprinkles settle the dust but don't do much. Little bunch grass clumps send out dusty green leaves that look a bit limp but are such a welcome sight. November rolls around and, maybe, brings the first 1/2 inch of moisture. Little annual grasses leap out of the ground overnight turning bare spots green. Usually they pause, not warm enough to really grow waiting for those first lengthening days of late February...
Of course this year we had a record-breaking October with 6 inches of rain. Temperatures are still pretty high. Green grass is shooting up, 4 or 5 inches tall in places. The new blades of perennial bunch grass are 6" tall.
Oh, and I can use my chainsaw again, though I wouldn't advise digging a post hole yet, there hasn't been that much moisture!
no subject
Date: 2021-11-06 07:08 pm (UTC)