January Thaw

Dawn on Thursday.

 January is a strange month. It’s just the first month and already the new year seems tedious and tired. The holidays are done and the excitement has gone. We return to routine. The next great event in the year is the coming of spring and that’s a long way off. I was thinking about how and why we celebrate starting a new year and wondered why we use January 1st. I did a bit of research and discovered that many ancient cultures didn’t start the new year on January 1st (or whatever their ancient equivalent of it was). The Romans did and the parts of the world they influenced did, but most of the rest of the world didn’t begin using January 1st until the late 16th Century – and that was because of the Roman influenced Europeans. The ancient Aztec and Maya celebrated the new year at the end of February. Many others cultures used dates in the spring around the equinox. The Hebrews still celebrate it in the fall at Rosh Hashana. I think I like the idea of moving New Years to another date (not that anyone anywhere is suggesting that). Sometime in the spring would be nice. January 1st is too close to Christmas, which is a big enough celebration already. Spring feels more like a time for beginning a new year’s cycle. January is too dismal.

Dawn on Thursday.

Aside from some beautiful sunrises, last week was pretty dismal, at least it was weather-wise. We started the week with bitter cold. Then on Thursday and Friday we had a thaw. The temperature rose into the 50's. It rained and almost all the snow went away. I was glad to see the old snow go. It was looking very dingy. The thing I like most about snow is how clean it makes the drab winter landscape look. When it gets dirty, it can go away. And it went. So for a few happy hours it felt and smelled like spring. But it didn’t last long. Even as we were enjoying the warmth, the weather service began issuing warnings of an approaching winter storm. They told us to expect the return of freezing temperatures. The rain would turn to ice and then to snow. I took advantage of the mild temperature and a lull in the rain to restock the woodpile on the back porch. Just as I finished with the last load, the wind picked up and the temperature started to fall. After sunset, ice began to fall. We could hear it hitting the windows like gritty sand. Fearing a possible power outage, I filled some pitchers and the bathtub with water. By the time we went to bed, the temperature had dropped into the 20's. When I woke up on Saturday morning, there was ten inches of snow on the ground. The world was white again. The thermometer read 9°. We never did lose our electricity, thankfully.

Thursday, the thaw begins.

Friday, the snow is gone.

Saturday, the world is white again.

I went out on Saturday morning to take a walk in the new snow. First I had to clear away a snowdrift just to open the front door. The tree twigs and bushes and brambles were encrusted with crystal droplets of ice. It was infuriatingly beautiful. I headed down our road to the highway. The plows had been out on the state roads, but not the township roads. I met my neighbor Neal Goodenough coming up the road in his truck and plow. He was coming back from plowing out his brother’s driveway. “I couldn’t tell where it really was,” he told me. “I think I just made him a new driveway.” With the previous days’ rain, the creek was still running high and water was flowing over the beaver dam. I took some pictures and headed home while I could still feel my fingers and toes. Later in the day the sun came out. The township plow finally went up the road around 2:00 and in doing so piled snow across the end of our driveway and buried the mailbox. Stacey and I went out with shovels to dig it all out. So our January thaw is over. It looks like the cold will be here for a long, long time.

The drift dug out from the front door.

On my walk.

Iced maple leaves.

Cherry twigs with drips of ice.

Stacey digging out the mailbox.

Digging out the mailbox.

A while back our children recommended that we watch The Great British Bake Off. I love to watch cooking shows, so we plunged right in. The show starts with a group of amateur bakers (sometimes 10 or 12) and eliminates one per episode to arrive at a champion. It was a great show. We watched all the seasons. We felt sad when we had come to the end. Then we discovered that there is also The Great Australian Bake Off, The Great Irish Bake Off, The Great Canadian Bake Off, and The Great American Bake Off. We’re in the middle of watching the Australian one now. Plus there are other international versions – Ver Firnia (Turkey), Le Meilleur Pâtissier (France), Heel Holland Bakt (The Netherlands), Mão na Massa (Brazil), and Das große Backe (Germany). That should get us through the winter.

On Friday we watched the funeral service for our prophet, Thomas S. Monson. It was a beautiful service. He was a great man who devoted his life to serving the Lord and his fellow men. I’ve always felt great love for him. Now we are waiting for the official announcement of the calling of a new prophet. We know, because the Lord’s house is a house of order, that the senior apostle, Russell M. Nelson, will become the 17th president of the Church. He is also a great man. At 93, he possesses a lifetime of experience and wisdom. From Joseph Smith to the present day, the Lord’s Church has been guided by a prophet, seer, and revelator and I thank God for that. In a world that is plunging into an abyss of immorality and chaos, I take great comfort in knowing that God loves us and has given us a prophet to guide us in these latter days.

Cold and glittering morning.

The linden tree sparkling with ice.

Iced crab apples.

It is sunny today, but very cold. It was -10° when I woke up this morning and now it’s gone all the way up to 11°. We’re home from church now. The drive to and from was a bit tricky today. At several places on the road between here and Genesee, the culverts that run under the road have frozen and the streams that usually flow through those culverts have come up over the road and turned into thick ice that has been churned by the traffic into deep ruts and ridges. We made it okay, but I’m glad we’re home and not going anywhere for the rest of the day. The rest of the day will be warmer because I’ve changed out of my church clothes into layers of nice warm clothing and I don’t plan on moving too far from any of the several sources of heat in the house. As soon as we eat lunch I plan on taking a good Sabbath nap and to dream, perhaps, of warmer times or places.

Sparkling Sabbath morning.