Archive for the ‘Images Captured’ Category
Happy Faces
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Here are two happy faces that just dowsed their thirst after we cleaned their water station on Sunday. Our animals can be a lot of work, but gosh darn, they’re worth it.
Say hello to Cayenne and Legacy.
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Is It?
Yesterday at work, I was describing the effort that was required over the weekend to clear snow from the entirety of our driveways, walk ways, and deck at Wintervale.
“Is it worth it?” the employee asked.
It didn’t take any time at all for me to switch from whining about all the work our enterprise demands of us, to the immediate acknowledgement, “Yes, it is absolutely worth it.”
Don’t get me wrong, I definitely have moments of wondering how we got ourselves into this situation. More often than not, we are in over our heads with issues that exceed our knowledge and abilities. But hey, nothing ventured, nothing gained. If we would have waited until we knew how to do everything we have accomplished thus far, we’d still be sitting in the suburbs, staring out the window at the side of our neighbor’s garage wall.
On Sunday, Cyndie took this picture of me enjoying one of the views we have earned from our move to the country.
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Taking Steps
The weather gives, and the weather takes away. After a couple of days with high winds, limited visibility, and repeated doses of accumulating snow, we received a gift on Sunday of blue sky and warm temperatures. We headed down to the labyrinth to reclaim it from days of blowing snow.
I had just walked the labyrinth wearing snowshoes last week, to clearly define the route, but now it was filled in to the point of being difficult to discern. It looked like it had been neglected for most of the winter. I made it most of the way through before finally getting fooled and taking a misstep. Actually, I just went a step too far before making one of the u-turns.
When we started into the effort yesterday, the snow was powdery, but in a very short time it became very sticky. That made our work a bit more taxing, and soon we were shedding layers in the heat of our second January thaw.
I hope that doesn’t sound like a complaint. It was magnificent.
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Cold Balance
While we were up at the lake last weekend, I captured this interesting scene. On warm winter days, the copper tops on the posts heat up just enough in the sunlight to melt the snow that rests upon them. The resulting moisture creates a slippery junction that allows the snow cap to slide toward the direction each post cover leans. As the sun descends in the afternoon, the copper cools and the junction re-freezes, leaving the sculptures teetering in place at unlikely balances, like this one:
We didn’t get to see if this snow cap eventually fell off on its own, because the temperatures never made it back up out of the deep freeze again prior to our departure for home. I expect they are locked in place for a few days more as we are now headed into what is predicted to be historic levels of cold temperatures for the next few days.
Oddly, we awoke this morning to temperatures above freezing (33°F) even though our predicted high for today is 24°. If it makes it down all the way to the low forecast for tonight, that will be a 50° drop in a day! Since we haven’t seen temperatures go this low in almost a decade, this could be the coldest weather that two of our horses, Hunter and Cayenne, will have experienced in their lifetime.
The barn is prepped and ready for the herd to spend extended hours under shelter of a roof and out of the wind. We have buckets with electric heat in the base to keep their water from freezing. We are hoping no pipes freeze and no more windows shatter around the house. This will be the kind of cold that tests everything: people, animals, trees/plants and machines. I haven’t heard how deep the frost has reached into the ground this year, but I expect it is getting deeper than it has been for a long while.
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Marco’s Pictures
I can’t say enough about what a wonderful fit our two families are, the Morales family from Guatemala and Cyndie and me. We are having a blast together. Also, I am particularly pleased to have access to pictures Marco has been taking. He zoomed in close on Legacy’s eye and captured a reflection of himself, and Dunia and me.
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We are up at the lake place this morning, after driving up yesterday. When we arrived and pulled into the driveway, Cyndie and I decided to give them a tour of the community property before pulling up to our home. As we arrived near the tennis court, I was about to point out the huge pine tree towering over the court where the eagle nest has been in years past. I was cut short by my own exclamation, “There’s an eagle!”
The sun had just set and the light was low, but Marco hopped out of the truck with his camera and attempted to get a picture. Later, as we were reviewing his shots on the computer, we learned the eagle wasn’t facing away from us like we had all 
believed. Though almost out of range, and behind some branches that claimed the actual focus, there was a surprising reflection of two eyes and a hint of the color of his beak.
He had been staring at us the whole time, when all the while we thought he was looking the other way.
Thank you to Marco Morales for sharing these fun images with me for use in the blog!
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Beautiful Fail
There is something about the pattern of that broken window that evokes a sense of a bird in the abstract. As if the window was trying to make something that didn’t quite turn out. Maybe I see it that way because it reflects a lot of my experience. I like finding art in unexpected things, and I’m finding the window is tugging at two different parts of me as a result. 
On the one hand, it is a failure that must be remedied. In that regard, it frustrates me because it is just out of my reach. I cannot just fix it here and now, on my own. It looms overhead with the ever-present threat of crashing down in a shower of glass.
On the other hand, it looks interesting. I like the spontaneous pattern that appeared, unaided. Part of me is wishing we could keep it. Of course, I am all about balance and symmetry, so I would need the window on the other side to somehow fracture, as well. Picture me trying to initiate that happening. Epic fail.
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Relative Something 