A Patch of Old Snow

There's a patch of old snow in a corner,

That I should have guessed

Was a blown-away paper the rain

Had brought to rest.

It is speckled with grime as if

Small print overspread it,

The news of a day I've forgotten --

If I ever read it.

              -- Robert Frost, Mountain Interval, 1916

I look around the farmhouse today, as the sun slowly rises, and I see a lot less snow than was here last week.  Frost's A Patch of Old Snow would still be bundle-sized instead of a few sheets, piled here and there around the house and barns, but there's more than enough bare ground to say spring is here.

Robins are dancing over the lawn this morning, interested in what the moles have tossed up overnight. Small limbs fallen over the winter lay scattered across the yard, discarded by the  old maple tree when the ice came on thick, followed by a heavy wind. I'll be gathering them up and adding them to the pile already started. They'll dry over the summer and work well for kindling.

The male ring-necked pheasant staying under the barn all winter has moved on. He survived the bitter cold and deep snow living off the scattered seeds dropped by other birds from the feeder. Warmer days and spring urges has sent him deeper into the woods in search of female companionship. May he stay healthy and safe and another generation come to winter under the barn.

The garden has shaken off the remnants of snow that covered it deep for months. Sleeping well through the worst of the bitter cold under the snowy blankets, strawberry plants are already looking green and ready for warmer weather. For the rest, soon there'll be tilling and digging and rows to be planted -- but that will have to wait awhile...

I'll take the wreath down from the front door -- hung in a different time, when hopes ran high at the beginning of winter, when the first flakes of snow excited the soul, rather than depressed later in the season.  Long forgotten behind the glass of the storm door, the boughs are still as green as when they first cheered us months ago -- but it is time to go.

Maine spring is here, in the mountains to the west.  Soon it will be the time of soil turning and planting, branch-harvesting and raking, garden planning and wishful thinking of harvests yet to come. 

No, soon I'll not have the time to read the wind-tossed papers of snow, tucked along stone walls and under deepest pine woods. News of spring has reached me here, and after a long winter, and a low wood pile, it's time to get going again.  News of the land tells it's own tale, and news of the world can wait awhile.

Finally, after a long winter (and it's not over yet) we had a decent weekend.  Temps in the high 40's, bright and sunny, no storms on the horizon.  A perfect chance to get out of the house (remember -- I work at home, so winters feel twice as long.)

Off my wife, Donna, and I go to do a little antiquing and grocery shopping. Late in the day we were stocked up and had a few more antiques for the farm house. It was time to go home -- or so we thought.  The Mazda had other ideas...

On the way home, I noticed the cd player started skipping.  Then the clock blinked off.  The turn signals seemed to plink faster on the dashboard whenever I made a turn. If I turned off my headlights the cd player worked. Then, by the time we reached the end of Castle Island Road, heading for Mt. Vernon, the car died. No long goodbyes -- one minute it was running, the next it wasn't.

Luckily, we broke down where our cell phones still worked, so my wife called AAA, while I got out and opened the hood.  I had no idea if opening the hood would do any good, but I did it anyway.  Yup, the engine was still there, right where I found it last time I opened the hood -- weeks ago -- to add wiper fluid. I wiggled the battery cables, and stared a while at engine parts. I wouldn't have a clue how to find the oil dipstick, let alone fix an electrical problem. I left the hood up (maybe a little fresh air on the engine would help), and got back in the car.

Donna was still on the phone with AAA, when I noticed a big truck pull up along side us.  I rolled down the window. Now in Boston, had we been in the same situation, horns would honk, lights would flash, universal hand gestures would pass along between drivers. Not so in Maine.

"Need help?"

I had to look up into the cab of the truck to see the driver.  I explained to her we were on the phone with AAA, and we would wait for the tow truck. Kathy (we learned her name later) was thinking faster than we were.  She offered one of us a ride home to get our second car. So, Donna rode off with Kathy, leaving me with the hood-up, hazard-flashing, electronically-challenged car.

It was quiet, waiting at that stop sign. A scene from MASH kept running through my head.  Frank Burns had driven a tank over Col. Potter's jeep. Potter pulls out a gun, and being the horseman he is, shoots the jeep.  I kept wondering if I should put the Mazda out of my misery.

Another truck pulled up. I explained I'd called AAA and we waved and they drove on.  A station wagon pulled up and we gestured through closed windows that I was fine and we waved to each other and the driver kept going.  Another truck rolled up and, again, I explained the situation.  We waved to each other and they went on their way.

It was growing dark now.  The occasional driver would roll up along side of me, I'd open the door (the electronic windows had finally died,) I'd tell them about the tow truck on the way, we'd wave to each other, and I'd be left waiting again. In the dark.  Thinking about bears. (Oh yeah, winter.  They're still hibernating aren't they?)

Finally, my wife showed up, pulled in behind me and set her flashers. Now, people driving past were fewer, and with the second car, they must have reasoned I was being helped and everything was under control. Not long after, the tow truck pulled up, hooked up, and towed my car to the garage we use.  We went home.  Maybe we should have stayed home. 

Then again, maybe not. I never felt safer, broken down on a back road, than I did that night in Maine.  No one <i>had</i> to stop and check to see if I was all right.  Some didn't, but most did.  I have a feeling in Boston it would have been the other way around.

To all the Kathys out there, and all the other anonymous aid-givers, we thank you for making the effort. You folks are why we moved to Maine.

Of course, I might wait until late spring before venturing out again.  I wonder if I should get a horse?  Not a whole lot of trunk space on a horse, though....

Except for the birds.

There have been some more exotic visitors to the feeders as well. While we have our share of hairy and downy woodpeckers this year, (who have the habit of rapping on the house whether or not there's suet in the feeders) the one that surprised me is the red-bellied woodpecker.

While the Cornell Lab of Ornithology website (a great bird information site, by the way) states this woodpecker has been expanding its territory northward in the last half of the 20th century, their map still shows its northern range into Massachusetts. The same map is seen in all of my bird books. Makes you wonder how accurate these bird range maps really are. It's a fascinating little bird to watch, pecking methodically at the suet to get the good parts -- fruit, nuts and seed.

Not a regular in this part of Maine, this one seems to be surviving well. He's taken up residence under the old blacksmith barn here and on early mornings, just as the sun is coming up, I watch him fly a short distance and glide to a stop under the seed feeder. He's been surviving on the scattering of seeds on the ground as the other birds user the feeders. Healthy and young, we're hoping he hangs around and entices a few females to take up residence around the farm. We'd love to see a little brood of chicks in the old fields around here this spring. And with posting the land against hunting, we hope they'll stay around where it's safe.

It's been too cold this winter to really enjoy the great outdoors, here in Chesterville -- for me, anyway. Not that I'm a warm-blooded southerner, used to swaying palm trees and soft ocean breezes (by the way, doesn't that sound great right now?) 

No, there weren't many palm trees in the Adirondacks where I grew up. Just lots of snow and bitter cold days, like here. But, when the weather cooperated I still liked to go sledding, building snow forts and, later as a teenager, ice skating with my brother on a frozen pond.

When I caught the photography bug later in life, hiking in the woods in eastern Massachusetts became a part of my winter activity. With a higher density of people there, trails in winter were often walkable in a good pair of hiking boots, if the trails weren't actually plowed in spots. Nice for the leisure hiker.

Maine's a little different in that respect.  Taking a hike in winter here takes on a whole new experience.  Snowshoes are a must. Now, I like old things, and having a degree in Anthropology, I like to experience first-hand how people lived in the past. So, my snow shoes were bought at an antique store and are of wood and sinew construction. I'd used them on unbroken trails in past years in deep snow and they worked quite well.  Not so, this year.

There's a wide trail near the house that goes to the top of a hill, with a nice view of the surrounding country. The cold this year had kept me too long in the house, and a couple of weeks ago, when the temperature was finally able to get into the 20s, I decided to strap on the snowshoes, sling my camera bag over my shoulder, and climb to the top of that hill.

Getting to the bottom of the trail was pretty easy, as it was plowed road all the way. Starting the ascent, however, I started to notice something odd. The snow this year was like a fine powder, the kind you find covering that doughnut you know you shouldn't eat but always do.  The snowshoes were sinking in quite deep, and moving through the snow was difficult.  Each step was a challenge, lifting one wooden snowshoe from behind to the front, shaking all the powdery snow through the gaps in the lacings. Climbing the hill became a focus of step-shift-lift-shake-step -- repeat as needed. 

A quarter of the way up, I stopped and rested.  The quiet of the woods was broken only by my panting (ok, it'd been a while since I'd done this kind of exercise...) I just kept telling myself: I can do this.

Half-way up, after a few (ok, many) stops along the way, I came to a large ridge of snow across the trail.  Shouldn't be a problem, I thought, I'll just go over it and keep going.  Wrong!  Little did I know I'd found the equivalent of snow quicksand.

Starting over that ridge, I realized the cold weather had produced small flakes all winter and no thaw and high winds had created some hazards you don't normally see. My snowshoes hit that drift and sank out of sight, and I was in up to my knees. As I struggled to go forward and pull the snowshoe behind to the front, I sank deeper, feeling the shoe I was standing on go sideways and sink to the bottom. I was now almost up to my waist and, balance gone, I toppled over backwards.

Snowshoes are great for walking on top of snow, but sideways, two feet into a snowdrift, they were lead weights anchoring me in.  Not good.  I had snow in places I never want snow again.  I was literally swimming in snow, trying to get out.  No luck, every move just pulled my snowshoes deeper.  I was wet and cold and getting colder. At one point, I stopped the struggle and thought I heard a dog bark. Was that the Saint Bernard with the brandy barrel strapped to it's collar, ready to pull me out? Unfortunately no.

It was a slow process, but I finally twisted my body forward, and along with a few twisted knee tendons, got to a place where I could grab a small tree at the side of the trail and pull myself upright again. Then it was only a matter of pulling those snowshoes to the top of the snow and slowly make my way back to the path I created coming up the hill. Cold, wet, half-frozen, I made my way back to the house.  Not a single photograph taken that day.  The wood stove heat felt great though.

Now that we've had a few thaws and there's a bit more of a crust on the snow, I may try that climb again soon.  Then again, my next trip up that hill may be after the first robins of spring are spotted. 

As many of you know who read this blog, from time to time I write about growing up on a dairy farm in the Adirondacks in the 1960s and '70s. As a kid you don't always know the struggles your parents go through when times are tough on a farm, but you know enough.  You know life on a farm is a struggle and there are good time and bad.  Mostly bad, lately for the small farmers. Living here in Maine now, I see there's bad time ahead for farmers again. This time, it may have a huge impact on all of us

Dairy farmers in the US are in desperate trouble. Probably not since the Great Depression (should we start calling our own economic times GDII?) has the milk industry faced such a crisis. Unfortunately, unlike the 1930's, there are more of us now who work in jobs totally unrelated to producing food, and more of us who think food prices are directly related to the farmers who grow the product.  Nothing could be further from the truth.

Take milk production. Most of us get our milk from the corner store or the mega-supermarkets.  We pay what the store asks, often without thinking about how that price was determined.  If the cost is low one season, we reason the farmers must be producing a lot of milk and the price comes down. When the price sky-rockets in the stores, we grumble about those farmers asking too much for their product and ripping the consumers off.  How little we really understand.

Some numbers to think about:  Dairy farmers do not set their milk prices -- that is fixed by the federal government through old, rather arcane rules (including the price of Chicago cheese commodities, which doesn't help farmers in New England.) Then there's the middle-men.  And there are a lot of them.

Farmers are forced to sell their milk to cooperatives and shippers that take the milk to the processing plants. There's added cost for fuel and wages for the truckers. Then there's the pasteurization process to keep milk safe to drink.  Added cost to the price of a gallon of milk. Then there's the cost of bottling and delivering that milk to all those stores that sell it to you and me.  More added cost.

Then there's the price those stores charge for that gallon of milk. This is where we grit our teeth and pay the price asked.  Or go without until there's too much product and not enough buyers and the price has to come down.

And what about that price? Some more facts:  Dairy farmers sell their raw milk by the hundred-weight.  Think pounds -- not gallons. Just one more area to complicate the situation. 1 gallon of milk = 8.5 pounds; 11.75 gallons = 100 lbs of milk. So, if farmers in Maine are currently getting around $12 per hundredweight, their share of the cost you pay in the supermarket (say around $4/gallon) equals just about $1. So, one quarter of the cost you pay at the supermarket goes to the farmer. The rest?  Well, we all know who gets that. Everyone else who handled the milk before it got to you.  Especially the supermarkets.  

And think about this. Price per hundredweight is expected to be as low as $8 by March or April. Maine farmers will be in real trouble then. Maintaining a farm is not cheap.  The average price for a milk cow in Maine in 2005 (the most current price I could find on the internet) was around $1300.  Let's say the average herd in Maine is 50. That's an investment right there of $65,000. Not to mention the cost of land, feed for the cattle, fuel for the tractors, vet bills, etc...

And now, on top of all this, a task force appointed by Gov. Baldacci is recommending a cut of 4.8 million in subsidies to Maine farmers.  At this critical time for dairy farmers in this state, I have to interpret this as at best, a lack of understanding on the panel's part of the importance of keeping this industry alive in Maine; at worst, a real shift by the Maine government away from agriculture as a way of life here in the future.

So, Governor, reject this cut in farm subsidies, support Maine farmers and help them weather this latest economic storm. Keep the long heritage of farming in Maine alive for future generations.  It's in your hands now.  Frankly, we need to keep dairying going for no other reason than relying on milk from China in the future, with all the risks that brings with it.  What do you say Governor?

And for you farmers in Maine (especially in the Franklin County area):  I want to hear from you.  How are you making it?  What do you see for your future in Maine? I'd like to pass along your stories here in this from time to time.

http://bangornews.com/detail/97120.html

http://morningsentinel.mainetoday.com/news/local/5850253.html

http://www.umaine.edu/mafes/publications/dairy.htm

Morning in New England. Dark slowly fades to murky light. Birds stir and flutter, sending a flurry of snow sifting down. Dim red through the trees in the east. The perfect Maxfield Parrish time of day has come.

A white canvas of snow blankets the old farm. White snow, tinged soft blue against the rough grey of old barn boards. Is it any wonder Parrish loved to paint in New England?

Parrish - Christmas Morning

Every morning I'm up early at the snow-banked farm house, ready to work with my colleagues in Ireland and India.  Watching the sky lighten gradually, especially on snow-covered, sunny mornings, is my favorite time of day. Early risers like me enjoy a special time -- when the day is new and all things are possible.  Sunsets might be more colorful and spectacular, but subtle morning light has it's own enchantment.

Parrish - Mountain Farm

Arise, sleepy heads!  Discover the morning light and  the promise of the day!

Parrish - White Birches

Read more about Maxfield Parrish

The catalogs are arriving in a flurry each day. The trek from the old farmhouse down to the corner mailbox is an adventure, bundled against the cold that bites cheeks and nose.  Heavy boots, heavier coat, muffler, gloves and hat cover all against the biting cold and wind.  Stirring out of the house on days when the temperature hovers around zero can be a challenge.  But, oh the rewards of the gardening catalogs!

They come beginning every January, when thoughts of first winter snow and Christmas sale catalogs are a faded memory. Daylight is still the lesser part of the day and cold, gnawing cold down to the bone, keeps you hovering about the wood-stove most of the time.  There's little to get you to stir out of the house on days like these, but the thought of the seed catalogs tucked in the grey mailbox at the foot of the hill keep you going. January turns to February -- nor'easters come and go, snow piles deeper at the door, but thoughts of spring are never far away.

The catalogs pile up on the table next to your favorite chair. You browse through them slowly, reading the caption under each plant photograph. Some are photos  of plants you grew in the garden last year, but you can't seem to remember the plant looking so lush and green.  No matter.  This is a new year, where hope, at times, is all we have.  It'll grow fine and tall and green this summer, with no bugs and well-mulched and abundant rain.  Our gardens are always perfect in the planning stages.

Then the lists begin.  There's the seeds from this company that are a standard for your garden, a must-have.  Add them to the list.  That company's catalog offers varieties untried in your plot -- select a few for the list. A large part of the mental gardener is about experimentation.  The new catalog offers more exotic plants, the kind your rational side says don't waste your money on, as it's likely never to survive the rigors of Maine. (Banana trees anyone?)

Out comes the garden journal you kept last year.  There's the list you kept for what plants worked well, what ones didn't.  There's the plants you decided not to grow next year, but there they are on your seed order list again.  Better scratch those off, rather than be disappointed again.  (But then, you never know.  OK, one packet of seeds rather than three -- we'll give it one more try.)

And then there's the garden map. Decisions are made where to rotate the crops and where the new, untried plants will go. Generals envy you on your cool, calculating manoeuvres in the battle of the garden to be. This will be the best garden ever, and planning it is half the struggle, and three-quarters the fun.

Catalogs closed, you sit in your chair, watching the puffy flakes of snow fall past the windows.  There's the garden, buried in snow -- waiting.  A new nor'easter is coming today. Doesn't matter. It's just a matter of time before the orders are placed, and seeds delivered. Just a little more time before the earth is turned and sprouts appear. And only a little more time after that before the first of the lettuce is picked and beans snapped.

Spring is coming.  You just have to keep hoping a little longer -- while thumbing through the seed catalogs for a dose of tonic against the winter blahs. 

Abby's gone.  No other way to say it really. The constant companion for my wife and I for the last sixteen years is no longer with us. The cat who would be human, (not to insult her in any way), had to be euthanized. We will miss her every day.

She was the second kitten we brought into the family, only a week after finding Emmy, by accident, at a church fair in Vermont.  Emmy turned out to be a little ankle biter and we quickly decided she needed a playmate. We were getting tired of pulling Emmy off our legs first thing every morning.  My wife found Emmy and it was my turn to look in the animal shelters for a companion kitten.

There was really only one choice as I walked into the holding area at the shelter, with the barking dogs and older cats trying to ignore their situation. Mind you, I could have taken them all home with me then and there, but, living in a small apartment in Boston, that wouldn't be practical. And then there was Abigail.

She and her brother shared a cage together. She was a ball of grey fluff, and as I walked toward her cage, she stuck her paw out and tried to grab me towards her. I could almost hear her saying "Pick me!  Pick me!" Of course I did. No choice really.

As she grew into an adult cat, Abby and my wife created a bond I never thought possible. Abby worshipped at the feet of her goddess, Donna. There really was nothing in the universe for Abby; life was waiting for her goddess to appear. Then all was right with the world. Oh, I was ok, and could be a good substitute, but I was a mere priest to the cult of Donna, who could sustain her until her goddess appeared.

Another amazing thing was her gaze. While you were petting her, she would stare directly into your eyes. Break that gaze to do something else, and you would feel a gentle pat of a soft grey paw on the arm or shoulder, reminding you to make contact again. A new book on living with cats states you should never make eye contact with your cats, that they don't enjoy it and feel threatened by it.  Nonsense.  Don't believe it. All our cats look you straight in the eyes, and for Abby, it was a form of non-verbal communication. For her, it was a necessary as that taste of milk every morning.

Abigail was the only vegetarian cat I've ever known.  She would walk away in disgust from the plate of canned cat food we might give the other cats as a treat. Tuna fish? Horrible. Cooked Turkey? Blech!  We never had the heart to tell her the dry cat food she ate contained meat products. No, her favorite treats were milk, cereal at the bottom of the bowl (with milk of course), and oatmeal cookies with raisins.

Let me just say, as a public service announcement, that raisins are not good for cats. Pre-internet, we didn't know this when Abby was a kitten.  While I was eating some raisins one day, Abby decided the scent was too much to resist and tried to poke her face in the box. Not knowing better, I gave her one.  She scarfed it down and asked for more.  I gave her a few, but it just didn't seem right so we stopped giving her any more. We were lucky she showed no ill-affects from it. But it became her obsession the rest of her life to sniff out raisins.

Over the holidays just past, while Abby grew sicker from a combination of inflamed bowel disease (IBD) and lymphoma, I baked cookies to give away.  One batch attracted her -- Oatmeal cookies. She found a cookie I was nibbling on and she tried to nibble too.  So I broke her off a few tiny pieces (without raisins, of course) and she ate them down and looked for more.  This at a time when she had slowly stopped eating. Those few crumbs got her excited about food for the first time in weeks.  And I will say she must have found one last stray raisin on the coffee table, which went suddenly missing.

So, there will be no more gentle pats for attention, no more snuggles in my arms while falling asleep at night (positioned so she could see her goddess at all times), no more long gazes while in my lap (while her goddess was out of the room), no more furry toys carried with mewling noises and dropped at our feet -- apparently because she thought we just couldn't feed ourselves properly.

No more trips to the vets for her (no more vet techs sent to the hospital for stitches), no more struggling to find the best position to sleep (when she could sleep), no more pain killers, no more fluid injections, no more struggling attempts to spoon feed her high-fat canned pet food to keep her weight up when she stopped eating. Just no more.

We lost our best friend, in this human/cat herd we call home.  There's an empty spot now, as we pick up and put away her favorite cat toys. Life goes on.  The other cats keep reminding us of that.

Abby

Special thanks to the staff of Falls Road Veterinary Clinic for all their help caring for Abigail.

Well, it's been a while since I lived through this kind of a cold snap for so long of a period, certainly not since I moved to Boston with my wife in the mid-1990s. So far this winter, we've dealt this frozen pipes to the kitchen at least four times. Personally, I'd rather be battling snow.

The danger of this kind of bone-numbing cold came through this morning, when I woke up from a sound sleep at 4:30 am, trying to listen for something.  I wasn't sure what I couldn't hear for a minute, but then I figured it out -- the K1 Monitor heaters had stopped running.  Not good on possibly (hopefully?) the coldest night of the year.

My wife and I were up and moving, stoking the wood stove in the living room and lighting the old wood cook stove in the kitchen for the first time this winter.  The 60 degree room temperature stopped dropping as the stove warmed up, and lighting the library fireplace took the chill out of the front rooms of the house.  The cats were more concerned about their daily allotment of half&half.  So, the fires were lit, the rooms were warming nicely, and the cats were milked -- all before 5:30 am.  And all before either my wife or I had a drop of coffee.  I think that was the worst of all.

We figured we'd run out of K1, (we knew the guage read 1/4 of a tank, and we'd had a fuel delivery scheduled for early next week) so we called our delivery company, and I went to work in the library, telecommuting to the warmer climes of Massachusetts.  Let's just say a fireplace in an old, 1820's house tends to only keep the chill off on the best of days; -20 degrees just creeps in everywhere, and unless you're sitting in the fire, some part of you just stays cold.

And I learned something about my electronic weather station this morning -- anything below -20 degrees just makes it go wacky.  At one point this morning, the outside temperature registered "OF", which I interpret as "Off the scale!  Stay inside!"  Or "Take the first flight to Florida and don't come back until March!"  Obviously, I need to upgrade my weather station to be more compatible with Maine weather (or Antarctica.)

The delivery truck came.  Doug, the driver, and I had a nice talk about why we lost our heaters when there was still a little less than a quarter of a tank (think long feeds and not enough pressure when the tank gets low) and an even nicer talk about our cats, especially the "little" kitten we took in this fall. She decided to get in Doug's face and introduce herself. She's very curious, and very round; the word "butterball" was tossed around a bit.

So, the alternate heat source is back on, maintaining a constant minimum temp in the house of 64 degrees. For that extra warmth, the fireplaces and wood stoves keep it nice and toasty during the waking hours.  We'll cross our fingers the pipes to the kitchen thaw out again, but we'll keep washing the dishes in the utility sink, where the water still works.  Once again, this old house keeps proving a challenge and a boon -- it really is the best of both worlds.  You just have to accept what comes along, and be prepared to enter survival mode occasionally.  Not so bad, really.

I've written earlier blog mainly about the four-footed visitors to the farmhouse.  This time of year, the opportunities abound to observe the two-footed kind. The bitter cold this year seems to be driving more birds to the feeders.

We've been accommodating them as best as possible by expanding our feeding stations and variety of seed.  Cracked corn and sunflower seeds; bell-seed feeders and plenty of suet in feeding stations around the house. Multiple stations across from the kitchen windows and a more concentrated station outside the library window, in among the bare branches of a very old hydrangea. We've been warmly rewarded with wonderful birds.

Blue Jays are heavy visitors, and a bit aggressive to the other birds. They have been frequent feeders on the suet, their body feathers puffed up against the wind and deep cold we've had over the holidays. Watching them up close, it's interesting to observe them wait their turn for a chance at the suet.

Their strongest rivals for the suet feeders have been a pair of Hairy Woodpeckers that seem to feed at first light, first the male, with his red spot at the back of the head, and then the female, swinging on the suet cage. The Blue Jays gather around them on the branches of the hydrangea tree, but the woodpeckers take little notice. After feeding, they move off to an old branch, tap-tap-tapping a few raps on the dead wood.

Then there are the Black-capped Chickadees, fluttering among the branches, finding the cracked corn and sunflower seeds in the large metal bird feeder nearby, waiting their turn swinging on the suet cage. These black, white and grey balls of feathers are some of the most energetic birds around the feeding station. Their wings flutter at the approach of a Blue Jay, but by mid-afternoon, the Jays have moved on and the chickadees feed unmolested.

Still other birds find their way to the feeders: Mourning Doves clean up the seed that falls from the feeder at the base of the hydrangea; Nuthatches climb head-first down the tree limbs, as juncos visit at first light.

And then there was an amazing sight the other morning.  My wife was on her way to the post office, and as I opened the kitchen door, I saw it -- a male Ring-necked Pheasant, strutting slowly past our cars and heading to a ground-level feeder filled with cracked corn and sun-flower seeds.  This is a beautiful bird, with the long, trailing tail feathers and a bright-white throat band.  It fed for a few minutes, and then sprinted across the snow to the old barn across from the house.  Next morning, I saw it in the dim morning light on the other side of the house, heading across the ice-crusted snowy fields.  We hope he keeps coming back often this winter... as well as our more common feathered friends.

     All heaven and earth

Flowered white obliterate...

   Snow...Unceasing snow

                                 HASHIN

Ah the power of a simple, 19th century Japanese haiku. What could better describe Maine in the last 24 hours?

Snow fell at a dizzying rate around the old farmhouse last night, and we discovered just how drafty these old houses can be. Still, with a roaring fire in the library keeping the front of the house warm and the wood stove cranking out heat in the living room, we were comfortable enough.

This morning, after sleeping in late and enduring the tramp of the cats across the bed as they desperately tried to get me up, I stoked the wood stove again and opened the curtains.

Snow. White, blinding, drifting, wind-carved sculptures of snow. Beautiful.  The only word to describe it. Magical even. Especially this close to Christmas. Of course, I'm sitting in the wood-warmth of the library as I write this, with no reason to have to go anywhere today. I have the luxury of waxing poetic about the swirling snow sculpting hollows around the base of the old apple trees.

As a young child, I loved snow, especially good, steady storms.  Especially those that hit on a school night.  There was always the anticipation, watching those fat flakes slam against the window pane as you drifted off to sleep that school might just be cancelled the next day.

Next morning, up at the regular time, getting ready for school slower than normal, one ear on the radio announcer while he ran through the lengthy list of school closings for the day. Nothing was more agonizing for us than waiting for the name of our school to come around.  They were read alphabetically and our school name began with a 'W'...  The wait could be almost painful, but oh, the joy when our school was finally among the list of closings for the day!

Then, as soon as the snow stopped, (and we always wanted it to stop as soon as possible after the school closed), my brother, sister and I would be bundled up tight against the cold and off we'd go to build snow forts or go sledding on our own version of Rosebud or a sliver saucer. I suppose if I was a kid today (physical age of course, as I'm still a kid, mentally) I'd plop down in front of the TV or computer to play video games. Oh what I'd be missing if I did...

Then there was a year when winter wasn't so kind, and bad drifts blocked the road below our farm and snow plows couldn't get through.  High banks along the old country road in front of our house meant the school bus not only couldn't go past, it couldn't even turn around after picking us up.  So, for a good part of that winter, (as I remember it) we had to hike out about a mile to the main road to catch the school bus.  Not only did we have to tramp through the snow and cold, we had to get up even earlier than usual every morning, just to catch the bus!

Makes you wonder how children did it every winter, hiking miles to the rural schools.  My hat's off to all the past children who made the trek for an education, and to the teachers who often did the same, just to teach those children.

Well, I guess it's time get bundled up and go clean off the car, and then come back in to thaw out at the wood stove.  I wonder if this snow's any good for making a snow fort?  Hmmm...

Thwack!

The axe bites a little deeper into the trunk of the waste tree cut down near the old barn this past September. It grew in an area where my wife and I will put in a shade garden this spring. The trunk of this small tree lays across the old chopping block we found here in the wood shed.

Thwack!

Deeper now, the length of tree trunk is almost cut in half.  Too green to burn, I'm trying to cut up the trunk, so the sections can dry in the wood shed.  Maybe these green trunks will be ready to burn in the spring.

Thunk!

I'm through, and the two halves of the trunk lay on either side of the chopping block. I'll toss these, along with some other scraps of limbs and small trees, along the interior woodshed wall. It's an old woodshed, with wide plank boards, carved with initials of past families. The dirt floor is lined with bark chips and fragments of wood, remnants of past winters.

Dry wood is stacked deep in one of the bays.  This wood we stacked (for the most part) this summer in neat rows near the driveway, covered with a tarp when it rained and exposed to the sun at other times. We worried whether it would be dry by the fall, or if the times we forgot to cover it from the rain would slow the drying process.  We needn't have worried. It made it fine.

So now I'm out in the shed, chopping up limbs and splitting occasional pieces too large for the stove. Every time I'm in the woodshed, getting the next load in for the stove and fireplace I size it up, this pile of stored-up warmth.  Do we have enough for the winter?

I guess we all must do it -- count the months left to the winter and estimate the rows of wood left in the shed.  And week by week, we keep reassessing the burn rate. So, I'll load up the wood cart and distribute the wood in the rooms where it's needed. I see there's snow in the air today but the temperature is near 30, so not a bad day, after all.  I'll keep a weather ear to the radio and an eye on the digital weather station gadget for those really cold nights.  Nights when a few extra pieces of wood end up on the fire.  Nights I hope we don't see many of this winter, but probably will.

By April, I'm sure the pile in the woodshed will be dwindling as quickly as the snow drifts shrinking from the base of the house. Then we'll order more wood and start the cycle over again.

It's that time of year again: snow is falling, the Thanksgiving bird is on its way to becoming soup, and cars pass you by, topped by the perfect Christmas tree, trussed up tighter than that turkey you had last week. The hunt has begun.

My wife and I will be getting a tree for the farmhouse, here in Chesterville, this year. We moved in last year in mid-December, and things were too hectic with the unpacking to think about a Christmas tree, so this will be our first since moving to Maine.  Come to think of it, this will be the first Christmas tree we'll have had in many years together.  Small apartments in Boston with (then) four cats isn't very Christmas-tree-friendly...

Of course, in the Adirondacks, hunting down our Christmas tree on the family farm when we were young became a year-long event.  My brother and I would note the best-looking trees all spring and summer when we went to gather in the cows that got into our woodlot or when we brought them in for milking in the evenings from the pastures.  There was always one that we were sure would do for a really nice-looking tree, but come winter, with snow-white fields as a backdrop, we'd always find fault with those trees that looked so good surrounded by the greenery of summer.

So, off we'd go hoping to find something better at the last minute. We always did, but sometimes it could be a challenge. For the brothers that is.  We'd slog on through snow drifts, dusk coming on, debating the merits of the newest tree. It was too tall, or not tall enough, or it tilted to one side or had too many bare branches down low.  Being the youngest, I'd be willing to take the last one we'd found as a 'possibility', but my brother was sure there was a better one on the next knoll.  So, off we'd go searching for one more tree...

Somehow, every year, we'd finally pick one, drag it back to the house and stand it up against the porch while we wrestled the old tree stand on the trunk.  I'm sure you remember the old metal stands, the ones with the spike in the bottom you'd hammer into the base of the trunk and then tighten the bolts (like something Frankenstein's monster would sport), hoping the tree would stand up straight.

But it never would, so we'd wrestle with the tree some more and spin it around to hide the bare spot toward the back, against the wall. There was always a bare spot... Then we'd tie it up to the wall for good measure to make sure it wouldn't fall over.

Then, a day or two before Christmas, we'd haul out the boxes of decorations -- some from the late 1800s (glass birds that clip to the tree limb), some from the 1950s (remember the 'bubble lights' and the big, round painted bulbs?), some the more modern strings of small blinking lights.  Up would go the strands of garland, and handfuls of tinsel would be tossed on the limbs as a last affect. That tree we looked all year for always looked grand to us when we were done.

So, this year, I think it's time to have our own tree again in this farm house and start a few of our own traditions.  We'll search the tree lots for the best one we can find, strap it on to our own car and decorate it with all of our old ornaments.  Then we'll see how soon the two youngest cats will race to the top of the tree and knock it over.  Hmmm... where'd I put that ball of twine?  Time to tie up the tree to the wall...

Another visitor we got to know soon after moving in to the farmhouse is the neighbors' cat, who loved the high snow banks last winter so he could look in and say 'hi' to our cats. This is also the same cat who stared down the snow plow driver and made him plow the road around him last year:

So, we'll get ready for the occasional bad weather with the nice days for snowshoeing and photography in between. There's even the odd chance I'll be on a pair of cross-country skis this winter. (The last time I strapped on a pair of downhill skis I was all of 23 and nearly wrecked my knee on the bunny slope in Blue Hill, Mass.... But that's another story...)