Sabbatical: Day 1

I guess I could have begun counting from the final day of classes last semester, but today is the first day I would have gone into the classroom had I been teaching, so this feels like the first official day of my sabbatical. Have I said that I am wildly grateful for such a luxury? [...]

Happy New Year

It was only an accident that I was awake for the actual moment of the new year’s arrival. Neither Carole nor I have been awake for the turning of the year in many years and last night we went to bed, as usual, around eleven o’clock, but one of the terriers woke me up jumping [...]

Between Storms

Just went out into a bright, sunny afternoon to shovel the walks and deck clear of last night’s foot of snow. It’s cold — hovering around zero — so the snow is light and easy to move. I cut a racetrack around the dogrun in back so that the terriers wouldn’t be over their heads. [...]

-15° F

Cold this morning. Big fire in the woodstove. Clearing sky, river with its first skim of ice. I’ve been translating poems by Tran Huu Dung about the Mekong Delta where — I just checked — it is 80° at 7:30 in the evening. Should have arranged my trip for January & February. Here is a [...]

Voted

Carole & I voted this morning before 8:00 at our rural Community Center. I think there are fewer than 300 voters in our voting district and I was number 64. I think turnout is going to be huge, especially among Democrats. People were in a very good mood this morning at the polling place & [...]

Big Snow

Usually we don’t get snow that sticks until well into November, but last night a foot of heavy wet snow fell. Toom me almost two hours to get home because the roads were blocked by jackknifed trucks. We lost power overnight, but it came back on around five this morning. When we went outside we [...]

Nuthatches & Hairy Woodpecker

I put the bird feeders up this weekend and dumped the dirt out of the big ceramic pots I grow herbs & peppers in during the summer. Took the screes down and put them in the shed & stacked the wooden deck chairs under a tarp. I’ve still got a few more things to button [...]

Fall Again

I’ve been enjoying fall this year, even more than usual. I grew up on the west coast in places where there was an observable but not spectacular display of autumn color. It wasn’t until I came to northern New York twenty years ago that I got the full experience or spectacular color and charged-up weather. [...]

Crow Verses

Three crows stroll along the dirt road: adolescents with somewhere to go. Somewhere important no doubt, but they let you know they’re in no hurry. Sunlight sheens their backs & they are comfortable muttering their dark joy.

Chickadees

The first chickadees have returned from their alpine summer range in the High Peaks to our foorhills. For the last several days I’ve been watching one of them, who sits on the powerline that runs from the road to the house, flitting methodically between this steady perch & the small blue berries of the dogwood [...]

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