The cows are slick in summer coats, shiny as polished glass and fat with lots of green grass. No thick, dusty coats gathering lice and dung balls and looking pretty ratty around the edges. No lugging round bales indoors and forking out the dusty rolags, straining muscles and groaning and complaining
The ground is bare for walking. No need for yaktrax or sand or cinders. No sudden loss of traction, windmilling arms and downward crashing. No hurting and hobbling for week afterward either. Each trip to the barn is a gentle stroll, counting the singers and wingers and watching for kitties in the walkway.
Leaves drape the trees like furry pelts, thick and green and luscious, damping down the sound from the highways and hiding myriad birds and insects. No rattling of bare and frozen sticks rubbing together in the gale like bony fingers clashing.
The katydids have started up. They creak and shrill all hours of the day and night. Did you notice that they sound a lot like cedar waxwings?
And speaking of sound. The only thing you hear from the weather outside is a gentle tapping as rain patters down on touch-me-not leaves and filters through the honey locust top. No howling, shrieking, snarling, storms, clawing at the windows and growling to get in.
Gentle breezes eddy across the rooms in the place of frigid drafts. Sunrises still glow and happen before noon. Sunsets wait until chores are over....or at least most days.
When I compare two pictures of the same blue spruces out in front, I have no trouble remembering which season I like best.....
BRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR! Great post. So true. Its nice to go to the barn this time of year. Its clean, quiet and its usually to saddle up a horse. In the winter its WORK, and lots of it. :)
ReplyDeleteUGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!! You and me both! I DREAD that last photo very much!
ReplyDeleteLinda
http://coloradofarmlife.wordpress.com
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Let those not so scary hornworms have a tomato plant or two--they morph into the sweet gentle hummingbird moth. Adorable! Your blog is one of my very favorites. Love your humor.
ReplyDeleteYour prose is often poetry, and so it is this time. And that last pic? While I love winter scenery, this past winter lasted far too long, and hasn't been gone long enough, for me to want to see it so soon.
ReplyDeleteSummertime, and the livin' is easy! Thanks for reminding us so vividly of its many delights and comforts.
ReplyDeleteLike the Rev. Paul, I enjoy all seasons in moderation. Winter's clear, crisp air and clean-sheet whiteness has it's allure. But week after week of shovelling and shivering? Yuck!
ReplyDeleteThe sound of birds and bugs in the leafed-out summer trees, the smell of freshly mown grass, the clash and clamour of a good T-storm after a hot afternoon.... These too are attractive, but day after day of 90+ temperatures and 70+ humidity is totally draining.
Beautiful, beautiful piece.
ReplyDeleteIf I had to choose one paragraph:
"Gentle breezes eddy across the rooms . . ."
Wow.
CDH, sometimes I wonder if the changing of the seasons is worth the misery of winter
ReplyDeletelinda, ditto, pretty, but ugh!
12, thanks, I let it go. No tomatoes this year anyhow, so I just let it much away on the ground cherries.
Rev. Paul, thanks! this summer, while beautiful in some ways, has been so unsatisfying. Seems as if it has barely arrived and now it is waning like melting wax
WW, fresh fruit and veggies! A love affair that only comes in summertime
Joated, not a fan of the extremes either, but a nice, mellow, summer day, with a brisk little breeze to liven things up...hard to beat.
Cathy, thanks! this place is beyond drafty, a benefit in summer, not so hot in winter. lol
Ahhh.
ReplyDeleteLife is so much EASIER these days, isn't it? I'm willing myself to live in denial of Weather To Come.