Winter's Arrival

Welcome back, Winter,

I've been thinking about what a bum deal you got.  Talk about roles in a family!  Your beautiful sisters are celebrated by so many.  Look at Ms. Spring.  She is fresh and tender, full of softness and pastels.  She dances in on breezes and bunnies and her coyness makes her so very attractive.  Then along comes sexy summer.  She is HOT with lots of skin showing and a come hither sort of look.  She tempts with luscious iced drinks, long leisurely days, and warm, tender nights.  Gotta love her for all that vitality.  And, finally, the queen of boldness, Autumn, meanders in.  Autumn flashes brilliant color with so much poise and nerve.  She takes over the stage and cannot be hidden.  Her deep, smooth voice is heard in the wind that shakes the dazzling leaves off the trees and her intensity is visible everywhere.

But you, Winter?  You they call Old Man Winter.  You don't come on stage with a legacy of vitality or sexiness or boldness.  You come with a weary eye, wrapped in scarves, gloves and boots.  Your gift is gray and wet and tends to make people cranky.  Not fair!  I admit that, historically, I have wished away your presence, hanging on through the sunless, dismal days of January and February, counting the hours until Spring arrived.   And, likely I will do that again this year.  But, for a brief spell here in December, I have made it a point to find beauty in your arrival.   I have made it a point to carry my camera on walks around town and I have looked for the rich starkness you provide.  It has been a delight to look for your entry into the world this year.  What do you think of your portraits?

I have decided that, in your own way, you have much to offer the world. Thanks for coming along!
Love,
Graciewilde

Details

    I considered taking on The  River Writing Challenge.  The challenge there is to look at the details and then write about them.  I wanted to commit to it but decided I was crazy to do that.  Knowing me, I would forget that it was all in fun and it would become another stressor on my daily "to do" list. Not a bad thing this week but, potentially, a self defeating thing next week.

      BUT...... on that silly list of 50 things to do in 2012, there is the one that has to do with seeing the colors and noticing the details so I am just going to do that.  For example , yesterday I pruned back the roses.  This is a job that I assumed a few years ago and actually kind of enjoy doing.  I don't know what I am doing.  I don't have any knowledge of roses (except that they are pretty).  I do know that they thrive if they are pruned back in winter.  So I get out there sometime in late December or early January and prune away.

   
      We have had some cold mornings this week but, by early afternoon, the temperature has been getting mild enough for yard work.   Yesterday, I headed out to the front yard (in my plaid flannel pj pants and dark blue sweatshirt), dragging a yard waste can and carrying small pruning shears and a glass of iced tea.  Yup, you read that correctly, iced tea.  The first thing that got me attention was those lousy thorns.  The little pointy ones can be just as nasty as the big incisor ones.  But the other thing I noticed was the color of the rose bush stem.  Who would have thought that it would be this lovely shade of red/maroon/deep pink?  But check out those thorns!






       
I went down the front sidewalk, pruning and trimming as if I knew what I were doing.  The roses can be spectacularly beautiful when they first flame out in May.  The retaining wall becomes a wall of red roses along the sidewalk and they just sing the praises of spring.  I was pleasantly surprised to notice among the bare branches and the thorns that there were still a few clusters of lonely summer roses, holding on, hoping to brighten the world for just a while longer.  But chop, chop, they went to pieces.

      Because, you see, there were a lot more of these leftover roses than there were of the summer survivors..  Tinged with fallish brown, broken leaves, speckled yellow and general winter drudge, they do not make me smile.  They make me miss the summer season long gone.  Funny thing is though, I can also look ahead and say, "Hey, May!  Come on over!"   Really, she will be here in five months. The wall of roses will be adored by passersby and I have the perfect view from my studio window.

      And then, mixed in with the leftovers of fall's frosts, I found a couple of pockets of winter beauty.  Look at this tangle of garden detritus.  I don't know what the swirly stuff is except that it appears to be a delicate dancer, gracefully leaping off the rose bush and spinning seductfively around and into the fallen leaves.  Old Man Winter does have his finer points, especially when he lets the delicate side show.  The gold and the brown suggest the richness that can be winter if I only look at the details.