Hazy Shade of Winter

According to the calendar, winter is still sixteen days away, though in these parts (and parts of us are excellent) normally by the first weekend in December we've had some very cold and unpleasant days that lets everyone know we are living in New England as the year ends.

Not unhappily for me, but I'm not seven and not hoping for a sled for Christmas, this year we are (so far) having warm days. Earlier this week in the sixties and for the last couple, very brisk mornings but temps in the middle fifties by the time the afternoon starts to fade. I am not complaining, but as a loyal if fallen away Son of Mother Church, I've been conditioned to believe that we pay for what we receive, and arguing 'but I didn't order this' will satisfy no one later in the course of the changing seasons.

That's my way of suggesting to those of us looking forward to the Norwich Holiday Parade, Winterfest, this Sunday starting at one from Chelsea Parade, that while it's now logical to look forward to a warmer than hoped for day, we cannot have long faces if the real winter arrives between now and then. What I'm concerned about is how long it stays after it gets here.

I'm concerned because I had experiences yesterday within minutes of each other that underscore Thomas a Kempis' notion that man proposes, God disposes. I walked past a landscaping improvement I've spent weeks observing that I've never understood. A lot of earth moving equipment and big trucks and burly men digging, dumping and flattening and gathering up has now more of less ended. I watched a fellow in coveralls and a hard hat (always a plastic hard-hat. Why?) spreading grass seed across a newly unearthed section of earth (yeah, it reads weird but that's what it actually is, everything on the plot was turned over). I sort of admired his optimism with the grass seed, since, after all, it is December.

Back at the office, I saw a squirrel on the front lawn of the building I work in. During the summer months there were swarms of squirrels and the random, or randy, based on the behavior I interrupted one afternoon that I will not go into (say no more) chipmunk, but in recent weeks as the days grow shorter, the numbers have dwindled. I still have a bag of peanuts (you NEVER know when the elephant parade from the circus will be in town and I was, very briefly, a cub scout, which is nearly a boy scout, except for the shorts and the neckerchief) and I threw a handful of peanuts out the window and he bounded towards them.

I watched as he juggled one peanut in her mouth (his? I can never tell one from the other but as long as they can, I guess it's okay) while maneuvering so to carry a second peanut. As she wrestled with the second one, a blue jay from the nearby tree hopped down and snatched up a peanut, too, despite a half-hearted attempt by the squirrel to run him (her?) off. The squirrel finally satisfied she had both peanuts under control, took off for parts unknown. That's when I began to worry about this not-yet-here winter.

The blue jay came down from the tree again, dropped the peanut he had stolen already, looked around and finding a much larger one, grabbed that one very pleased with himself and flew away. I'm afraid we could be making snow angels around here until Arbor Day.
-bill kenny