7:41 a.m. 55 degrees (61 degrees warmer than last Saturday), wind SSE 11 mph, whistling and roaring. Sky: overcast and steadily raining. Then, steadily pouring. An unbearable deluge. Snow in full retreat. Feels like April, replete with mud. The warm air on melting snow spawns ground fog, rivulets flow into the marsh and vanish. Permanent streams: upper . . . iceless and rushing, loud as ever; lower . . . churns through ice tunnels, over snowless rocks and frozen patches. Brown water freights silt and random maple leaves. Wetlands: marsh mostly snowless, beige with splashes of white. All creases and folds on the hillside, all gullies along the road, funnel water and cool air into the basin. Deeper in the middle, getting deeper by the moment. Pond: overflow gushes out of the culverts, under the road, and into the alders. Rain and snowmelt, puddles on ice: feeder stream, rushing and loud, a ten-foot cut through the surface. Old deer tracks are ice-gilded and underwater.
Crossbills off to feed. Birds and chatter fade in the rain. Everything else must be home opening presents.
At the feeder: Ernie, the Hungarian partridge, under an Adirondack chair, faces south into the wind and rain, a smooth, oval, water-repellant bird. Like a grouse but smaller. Like a quail but larger. Blue jays soaking wet and bedraggled, dull light drains color. More gray than blue.
Secrets of the front yard. Chickadees and titmice select one seed at a time, then hide it nearby, well above the ground. Jays fill crops, which bulge like goiters. Hairy woodpeckers spill more than they eat. When good seed is finally found, woodpecker flies off, leaving the lawn littered and dark . . . an accessible harvest for turkeys, doves, Ernie, and gray squirrels. Chickadees and titmice occasionally fly down and grab one.
Me in the sunroom, watching the woodland food bank, captivated by the unintended spirit of giving, a community of socialists.
"the unintended spirit of giving"--wonderful phrase. I think of the 14th Dalai Lama Tenzin Gyatso who said , "My true religion is kindness", found in his 1984 book, KINDNESS, CLARITY, AND INSIGHT:
http://www.e4thai.com/e4e/images/pdf/dalailamaebook/Kindness,%20Clarity,%20and%20Insight..pdf
For other creatures, kindness may be unintended--but for us humans, it has to be a conscious choice. I've always believed a crisis teaches us the truth about ourselves, and certainly COVID has shown us those who choose kindness--and those who do not. Wishing you the kindness of your woodland society.
I think I'm going to keep a running journal of each final comment in your posts. Sometimes I have to make myself ...wait! Not rush ahead to see what you will say.