Contrasting nature
Nature is contrast. Less than two weeks ago, we were at –12°F, cold-to-the-bone with bleak, beautiful powdery snow, so cold, so dry, it squeaked underfoot. About a week later, I had doors and windows open letting near 70° air waft through the house. Having grown-up in Maine, I knew the dangers that winter can bring.
On the Maine coast, a nor’easter churning counterclockwise off the sea, with blizzard winds and horizontal snow, simply left no predicting what to expect. You hunkered down. Well-insulated pipes were buried beneath the frost line. Firewood or number 2 heating oil was stocked-up for the winter. Snowshoes, cross country skies, sharpened ice skates, and waxed toboggans were readied for winter play.
The quiet winter air, sound damped by snow created a thick silence, which was sliced through by the occasional jarring whine of a snowmobile jetting down wooded hiking trails turned speedways. Cold is cold. I chose the comparative warmth of Arkansas winters for my adult life. Texas was never a possibility.
Now the contrast begins anew. Jonquils are popping-up, and soon our streets will be lined with butter and lemon-yellow blossoms, hidden beneath the ground until days lengthen to the point where extended hours of sunlight spark the leaves to push up through the dirt.
Crocuses are finding their way above ground. It has more to do with day-length than warm weather. Soon, many trees will be blooming, seldom noticed for their minute flowers. Laden with pollen, junipers (red cedar) will take on a dusty rust tint. Allergy sufferers will know what time of year it is.
We’ve had a few years of mild winters. We were due for a good deep dip in the jet stream. My global warming denier friends had a field day. “What do you think about global warming now?” they snorted in self-righteous scowl.
“More frightened,” my response, which garnered a scornful laugh (except for my friends in Texas). Of course, what was obvious to me was obvious in just the opposite way to them. Except, I, too, don’t “believe” in global warming. Instead, I accept climate change for what it is—an expression of my own contrasting self-righteous thoughts, buoyed by a flair for the obvious.
What appears to be black and white, simply isn’t. It’s a slow steady adjustment on the contrast dial of nature. Sometimes Mother Nature messes with the controls.