Archive for the ‘Chronicle’ Category
Faulty Plan
It was only two days ago that I wrote about the low angle of our December sunlight not providing much melting power. With that knowledge well in hand, what made me think leaving a thin coating of snow on the driveway last weekend was a good idea? Wishful thinking, I guess.
The accumulation had only amounted to a whopping quarter to maybe half-inch of snow across our pavement. It didn’t seem near enough worthy of plowing. Additionally, the days following were predicted to have some sunshine with high temperatures well above the freezing point.
I visualized the tire tracks would move the snow aside and the melty days would then bring out the pavement simply by letting nature take its course. Nature had a different plan.
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Yesterday was the warmer of the two days but all that accomplished was enough melting to turn the snow to ice where the tire tracks packed it down and we’ve run out of warm days. Not only will the temperature drop, today it is expected we will receive between 4 to 8 inches of snow that will cover the icy mess on the driveway.
That’s pretty much a worst outcome in my mind. It will be harder to clear the new snow and the frozen tire tracks will likely linger long into the snow season. The opposite of what I wanted.
🎶 Slip sliding away…
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Customer Serviced
It was my mistake. The website was precise in clarifying the quantity was “1 bracket” and I knew I needed two, so I ordered two. When my package arrived, the box revealed it was “One kit.”
I didn’t need to order two.
These weren’t cheap. Despite my preference to simply ignore the whole dilemma and have it fade away as if it never happened, I figured my time was easily worth recouping the otherwise wasted money.
There was no information about returns included in the package and the emailed receipt was incredibly oversimplified and devoid of any helpful detail. I pulled up the site online. While I was hunting for links hinting about support or customer service, an invitation to chat materialized in the lower right-hand corner of the window.
I always prefer chat sessions over waiting in the queue after navigating a phone maze to speak to a customer representative. The chat window launched with a well-labeled “automated response” offering me an opportunity to see the latest sale promotions.
Discounting that opening gambit, I typed out my initial query asking how to proceed with a return.
A notice appeared indicating there was one person in queue. No problem for me. The chat window was off to the side and I was simultaneously multitasking on actual work.
After a reasonable wait, a second “automated response” popped up asking for my email which would allow them to contact me at the next opportunity. I willingly complied.
Minutes passed. Eventually, many minutes passed. I watched my email and that notice indicating “one person in queue” for any hint of activity.
In hope of priming the pump again, I typed into the chat window asking if communication would move exclusively to email.
Do you know that scene in “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off” where principal Ed Rooney is at the front door and finally hears the taped dialogue start over again? That was my experience when it was confirmed for me that I was talking to a bot.
The chat window responded to my latest question with an opportunity to see the latest sale promotions.
After a pause, a second “automated response” popped up asking for my email which would allow them to contact me at the next opportunity.
Later in the evening, I spotted a new message in my email from the company. Subject line: “Hot Exclusive Prices That Won’t Last Till 2021!”
I’m pretty sure they have me right where they want me, and it has nothing to do with providing information on returns.
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Another Solstice
Winter 2020 arrived at our location at 4:02 a.m. CST this morning. For all the action going on in the universe beyond our planet, this solstice phenomenon is just between the Earth and our sun. In the northern hemisphere, we are at the shortest day of the year. The hours of daylight will increase from now and grow for the next six months.
We are more than ready to be headed in this direction again. 2021 is not far off now.
During our midday walk around the property yesterday, it was very noticeable that the angle of sunlight was very low. Shadows were long. The amount of melting power on a clear day in December is greatly reduced as a result of that low angle.
Plenty of white remains over our land, albeit only a fraction of what would be considered worthy any winter sports endeavors.
This time of year brings the earliest in the evening that we venture down to close the chicken coop for the night. It’s a swing of between four and five hours from how late the process occurs in June.
Ahhh, June. I guess it’s a slip up from living in the moment if I am focusing on six months in the future but there is the added incentive of longing for a time when pandemic isolation isn’t the prime order of the day.
The highlight of our day yesterday came early, during our viewing of the CBS “Sunday Morning” broadcast. There were multiple segments of heartwarming value, not the least of which was the cover story, “Promoting the Power of Kindness.”
“Kindness is a power we all have. We just need to decide to use it.”
I couldn’t have said it any better than that. (You can click the image or the link above to view the 7:44 minute story.)
Be kind to someone today on this winter soltice.
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Snow Shots
The spectacular fresh snow views lasted a whole day yesterday. I took some pictures.
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From the fields to the forest, it all felt very picturesque and somewhat monochromatic.
I also like some of the unique aspects that result, like the way the snow was beginning to slide off the fence gate.
On the deck, I noticed that the perfect shadow of the railing details revealed how gently the snow must have fallen that night.
Today, the sun is already shining bright. It will likely be a day of disappearing snowflakes.
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Overnight Snow
It’s so much more gorgeous to have snow brightening up the landscape this time of year. We awoke today to a nice coating of white covering everything, which pleasantly provided a precise visual for the travels of our resident wildlife on Delilah’s and my walk this morning. The timing of snow and our walk meant that we came upon individual, single tracks from the fox, raccoons, deer, and a cat who visits almost daily.
The chickens showed a reasonable bit of hesitation upon exiting the coop, but quickly got over it and skittered their way through the trees toward the barn for breakfast. They didn’t linger long there. Before Delilah and I had even completed our full circumnavigation of the property, the chickens had scrambled across the driveway to one of their favorite spots beside the shop garage.
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Rocky was his bold self despite his aversion to putting both feet down into the white stuff. There is a lot of single-foot balancing that goes on during the snow season for our birds. They’re such chickens.
Yesterday, while traveling the trail on the southern border of our property, I caught sight of a bald eagle circling the precise location where the chickens hang out, flying just above the trees. Before I could react, I found the birds were all under the barn overhang and the eagle was already moving on to the neighboring fields.
It was an immediate relief but obviously only a temporary reprieve. Our birds free range in a cruel rural world where predators prowl.
Every day they come through unscathed is a victory we celebrate.
Tomorrow through Tuesday we are expecting sunshine and daytime temperatures above freezing, so the white-flocked Christmas card views out our windows won’t likely last.
Nothing lasts forever so we practice appreciating the sacred in each precious moment. A fresh coating of pristine white snow helps to make that exercise a breeze.
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Like Christmas
One week away and it’s occasionally feeling like Christmas is drawing near, except it’s as if it is on the other side of a blurry sneeze guard.
Cyndie and I tolerated a COVID Thanksgiving all by ourselves as well as can be expected. Doing so again for Christmas just a month later is proving to be a little more distressing. Plans are being considered to choreograph separate socially distanced and masked visits but every option is a frustrating variation of the same fiasco.
Why is it so hard to take a year off from normal activities?
I find taking a long view makes it easier for me to accept, but it comes at the cost of glossing over more immediate events. It’s a defensive mechanism, I suppose. I don’t feel as much stress over the loss of normalcy this Christmas when I’m framing the isolation as a step toward having life back to usual next year.
I am prepared to do absolutely nothing with no one for as long as it takes to reach the point where pandemic is no longer a thing.
The day that the use of face masks is declared a thing of the past will feel like Christmas, no matter what month it is at the time.
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Embracing Compassion
When the day comes that somebody asks you which side you are on between love and hate, how will your choices align?
Seeking to become a more compassionate person is not rocket science. Learning to open our minds to concepts beyond our comprehension takes a little practice, but since we start practicing the expansion of our understanding from the moment we are born, it is something we know how to do.
Unless something stifles our progress or we let ourselves forget that we can do it.
Compassion: | kÉ™mˈpaSHÉ™n | noun …sympathetic pity and concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others.
If parents raise their children with compassion, demonstrate compassion for others, and nurture the art of practicing the expansion of understanding, generations of more loving people will multiply.
We all do better when we all do better. – Paul Wellstone
There was a time in my life when I felt an unwarranted level of confidence about the way I perceived the world around me, and it involved a lot less grey areas than I am inclined to accept today. There was also a time when I could read small print without glasses. My understanding has expanded and continues to expand.
Sometimes, I find myself unable to understand things I see about the way people behave and the messages they convey, but I strive to become open minded enough to choose to love them as best as I can muster. That effort is a work in progress at times, I’ll admit, but the desire to be more compassionate endures.
Last night, Cyndie and I stumbled onto the CBS broadcast of “Play On: Celebrating the Power of Music to Make Change,” a benefit concert of music crossing multiple genres that radiated compassion and love. The pandemic and renewed push for social justice in the face of repeated police violence against people of color are igniting an energy momentum that deserves to burst forth with a new level of compassion throughout the world.
I hope people will choose to join the side of love.
Too many are facing hunger every day. The world needs more love and compassion.
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Minor Minutiae
…the small, precise, or trivial details of something.
Trivial details, I got.
One thing that bugs me is how my attempts to craft simple little features without engineering them to a level of “bombproof” end up reflecting the amount of proper preparation I failed to put into the effort. (See how I twisted that around?)
I really am pleased with all of the features and framing of that image I captured, but the intended subject was simply the “out-of-level” timber frame I installed as a base for a portable sink feature Cyndie wanted beside the door during summertime. I’ve commented many times about my surprise over how much the ground is constantly moving. It’s like the surface of the sea, except it moves a little slower. Currently, the right-hand side appears headed for the trough while the opposite side is reaching a crest of the rolling land wave.
I was so proud of the effort I put in to make that frame level when I built it. I have no idea if there is a prime time of year to re-establish level again, but I’m guessing it’s not while the ground is frozen. It doesn’t really matter for the sink. I just don’t like the sagging look it presents loud and clear every time I walk up to that door.
While I was taking that picture, two of the Barnevelders showed up to see what I was doing, in case it involved any scraps of food a chicken might enjoy. It didn’t.
I love how the closer bird looks like she’s got a foot like a duck and it’s kicked out at an odd angle. It’s a leaf she’s probably standing on. You can’t really see her feet buried in all that snow.
That dusting of flakes was just enough to make things a little slippery in places on our trails and combined with a very noticeable drop in temperature, are making it feel a lot more like December around here. I actually had to dress like it’s winter when I took Delilah for her bedtime stroll last night. Overalls, extra top layer, and mittens! Not gloves. I wore gloves in the afternoon walk and realized it was time to change so the fingers don’t each have to fend for themselves against the frigid temps.
If you are reading this from some warm climate, don’t feel you need to be jealous of how great we have it to enjoy such a full depth of seasons throughout the year. I heard a weathercaster on the news the other night speak erroneously, probably from having the long spell of unseasonably warm weather and getting out of synch with the season. She emphasized that it could get “below freezing” when she meant below zero (F) with the wind chill. It was already below freezing.
It’s enough to make little chicken feet long for the warm sands of summer.
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Baking Therapy
After surgery, most people opt for physical therapy to aid in healing and recovery. This weekend Cyndie appeared to be working on reclaiming her former knee strength by way of baking Christmas cookies of almost every variety. With the COVID-19 pandemic decimating innumerable facets of what we consider normalcy this year, I am awestruck over Cyndie’s motivation to carry on her massive holiday baking tradition without the usual support staff of friends or extended family.
To do it all alone is wildly impressive. To do it alone on a painful wounded knee is rather beyond the call of duty if I do say so myself.
The sum total of my assistance involved taking full responsibility for animal chores, which I was doing anyway so she wouldn’t have to walk more than she already does around the house.
I couldn’t even maintain my reputation as a taste-tester. The batches were coming out of the oven too fast to keep up. I think I exceeded my self-inflicted strict ration of ingested sugar simply by breathing in the smell of fresh warm cookies all day long.
I just didn’t have the gastrointestinal stamina to pound that many test tastes in such a short span of time.
I am curious to find out how the baking therapy worked out for her knee on the day after. She has a follow-up appointment today with the surgeon to check on progress. I wonder if he might suggest eating fresh-baked holiday cookies to help her deal with the residual pain of the excavated bone behind her knee.
It would, at the very least, be easier than working upright in the kitchen all day…
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Relative Something 