Winter Equations

Everything has to have a good side, right?

Every cloud a silver lining?

Even winter?

But is that possible?

Well, for one thing, in winter there are more pockets available for birding gear and other sundries....little notebook, good pen, thin, yet warm gloves so one can write and adjust the binoculars without baring their freezing fingies. 

And those are just in the down vest. In other garments there is room for the midnight flashlight, a box of matches in case I get stranded in the backyard, and anything else I might want to carry...phones...books....all the wool socks so I can carry towels downstairs too without making an extra trip.......yeah, lots and lots of nice pocketses are a real plus in winter. 

And then you have mornings like Sunday, when the world was coated with frost and fine snow and the sun came up pink and blue and all was sparkly in those colors and every steam and smoke glowed as if backlit and you could see a sparrow a mile away against all the pastels....

Yeah, that was spectacular indeed and I hope you were up in time to savor it before it all melted and turned the world stark grey-and-white again. If I said it once I said it ten times....what a day it would have been for the Christmas Bird Count! You couldn't have missed a single bird, so brightly did they all stand out against the snowy, frosty, steamy background. 

It was like driving through a thousand Christmas cards, complete with evergreens and cardinals and chickadees. Of course we weren't actually birding, but rather shopping and visiting, but if we had been we coulda knocked one out of the park.

Today....too darned much snow and too darned cold, and too darned grey and gloomy, but on the plus side of the equation....a heated Milwaukee hooded sweatshirt with the battery charged and the switch turned on.......

Priceless!