Like Marchruary
Is it possible that you are able to see that this image was taken when the temperature was below zero on Saturday morning?
It is a reference for the next image that I shot yesterday afternoon.
That outdoor temperature of 45°F was in the range of average for the month of March, not February. Both Delilah and I wanted nothing more than to just be outside in the warm sunshine.
I offered to brush her multiple layers of hair out on the deck, flashing a bag of tasty treats as periodic reward for her cooperation. The only cooperation she offered was to sit down every time I neared her back legs so that I couldn’t be the least bit effective.
It became a game where I offered a treat to buy more time and she would soon after, sit down so I would feel the need to offer another treat to get her up again. I didn’t get much brushing done. I switched focus to tossing some discs for Delilah to chase in the back yard.
She pretty much wanted to sit down after only a few throws of that exercise, too.
I think she is starting to feel all of her nine-and-a-half years of age. Average age for a Belgian Tervuren Shepherd is 10-12 years. She is starting to act as if she is getting old.
My next attempt to make her feel young again was met with complete disdain.
I made a snowball out of the sticky snow and started rolling it down the hill. When it got big enough that it was difficult to push, I stopped and looked up to find her completely ignoring me.
When I decided I didn’t have any interest in making a snowman out of my giant snow boulder, it occurred to me that I was feeling my ripe old age.
.
.
Just Watching
Day after day, reports are given about the numbers of Russian troops massing along the border with Ukraine. We’ve been hearing about it for months. What would it take for this conflict to not happen?
Over and over we hear about the mass detention of Uyghurs in China while nations continue to do business with the country and allow them to host the Winter Olympics. What would it take for the persecution of innocent people to not happen?
To where should the millions upon millions of refugees and displaced people on the planet fleeing from conflicts or natural disasters migrate? What if the countries of the world worked together to solve the need to find homes for displaced people?
Why are some US people so desperate to prevent the inclusion in our public education system of the true history of racial injustices in this country? What if we all accepted what really happened?
It’s as if the human race is incapable of avoiding the creation of our own pain and misery.
Imagine if Putin put all the money and effort of his troop build-up and cyber warfare into making life better for all the individual citizens of Russia. Imagine if Communist China put all the expense and effort of spying on and controlling their own citizens toward making the happiness of all its people the number one priority.
Imagine if the US government was actually functional as a two-party system that collaborated to accomplish the will of all the citizens.
Imagine if all humans felt equal amounts of empathy for others who are suffering. What if all people were fully attuned to their gut and heart intelligence, in addition to their brains, and functioned in complete balance among all three?
Adulting can be hard. Emotional intelligence much?
I recently watched a documentary movie that made a big impression on me. Afterward, I searched online for information about the movie and came upon a series of reviews critical of the many shortcomings of the film. Reading the critiques helped me to more fully process what I’d seen and tempered my reaction to it.
The writer/director wasn’t wrong, but neither were the reviewers who found fault with his movie. None of us are exclusively good or bad, or right or wrong. We are all of these.
Still, I wish we didn’t have to just watch helplessly while conflicts around the world play out in a relative slow motion display of the worst of human behaviors.
Put a little love in your heart
and the world will be a better place
.
.
Wind Blown
If this weren’t a time when the obvious effects of global warming were well known I might think the local weather was some sort of plot by the universe to drive me insane. The dramatic swings between too warm and bitterly cold in a matter of hours every other day is crazy making.
After a biting cold 0°F start to the day, yesterday’s high temperature climbed to 36°F under a hazy sky, but the short-lived meltdown was obscured by the sudden arrival of gale force winds that audibly flexed the integrity of our log home. The gusts whipped in a hasty change of temperature that dropped us to 7 degrees below zero this morning.
Thankfully, the wind has stopped, for now, and the sun is out, bathing the horses in its relative warmth. The forecast for tonight suggests a return of breezy conditions and tomorrow, a high of 43°F.
Freezing and thawing at this rate at this point in winter is harsh.
During the morning feeding yesterday, I heard a strange noise all of a sudden on the roof of the barn. Looking out the door revealed a downburst of what I call “Dippin’ Dots®” snow, which seemed unlikely at the cold temperature.
It looks similar to styrofoam.
The wind was sweeping off any flakes that hadn’t melted into the general mass of our snowpack and leaving much of the “dots” behind.
Coming out of the woods on our walk, Delilah and I stopped to watch the spectacle of dancing “snow-devils” gyrating in the distance across the hayfield where there was no shelter from the hurling wind.
After the evening feeding was complete and the sun was getting low in the sky, we were eager to get back to the house and out of the wind for the day.
Thankfully, Delilah is keen enough to not require a walk when it is time for a bedtime potty break. We stepped out the door, she squats to pee, and we are back inside before there is time to feel abused by the wind.
As the planet warms, the local weather seems to grow increasingly bizarre. It has me wondering what weirdness might be unleashed come spring.
Gale force winds, maybe?
I guess that wouldn’t be all that bizarre. Maybe it will be exceedingly perfect and usual. That would definitely seem strange.
.
.
Nose Knows
Against my best effort to thwart Delilah getting after something we wouldn’t want her to have, I came out entirely outmatched. It’s not that I doubt her olfactory abilities, it’s just that I’ve seen her get excited over so many spots that turn up nothing that I hoped this would be one of those.
It’s not uncharacteristic for her to venture off-trail to follow some critter’s paw prints, stopping at whatever point I decide to lock her retracting leash. I rarely allow her to go past our property line and usually stop her from forcing me to step off the trail, but generally grant her the added excitement of some varied explorations beyond the obvious path.
The other day, she fervently wanted to go after something that she sensed while we were still on the trail. With a complete lack of interest in her goal, I waited as she made her way as far as the leash reached into a tangle of growth. I waited and waited.
We each held our ground until I finally decided to tug the leash and talk her into coming back to the trail. She reluctantly came out, took a couple of steps on the trail, and then headed right back into that tangle from a new angle. She really wanted something in there, so I decided to take a look for myself.
I pulled her back until I could clip her leash to the nearest tree and then I wove my way through the mess to look for the most likely attraction, typically, something dead.
Finding nothing, I came out again to let Delilah have her wish and allowed her to get all the way in there so she could sniff around and find nothing, too.
She rushed back in there and made her way directly to an undisturbed spot of snow, put her face in it and immediately started crunching on some bones. That was exactly what I didn’t want to happen.
I had to go back into the tangle again because she showed no interest in coming out to the trail at the moment. I negotiated a release of her clenched jaw holding what looked like a rib bone.
It was about fifteen feet from the trail under the snow and her nose absolutely knew it was there, most likely dropped by some predator who had cleaned the meat off and left it for other scavengers.
With the fresh bone now tucked into the back pocket of my overalls, I had Delilah’s full attention all the way back to the house. In reward for her letting me take the precious find away from her, I served up a sanctioned purchased bone in place of the wildlife remains of unknown condition.
Her nose didn’t seem at all disappointed in the difference.
.
.
Close Supervision
I was still so excited yesterday morning about the arrival of fresh bags of feed that I snapped a picture to capture the moment. So excited, in fact, I couldn’t hold still to press the button.
Don’t adjust your glasses. Don’t squint your eyes. That is a blurry image.
It’s always a good feeling when the barn is freshly stocked with bales of hay and bags of feed. That positive energy is picked up by the horses and they were in a wonderfully pleasant mood yesterday morning during feeding.
I was still finishing up with cleaning when Mix and Swings approached after all the feed pans had been emptied.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
I think they were comparing notes by way of nose proximity.
“Do you smell what I smell?”
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Mix’s curiosity was satisfied but Swings wanted to get a second whiff.
I was so focused on looking at them that I got startled when I turned to the left and found Light had silently snuck up on the other side of the fence to see if she was missing out on something.
It is such a treat to have them being so social after witnessing their level of hesitancy to be near us when they first arrived last April.
I’m more than happy to have their close supervision of our activity any ol’ time. Especially now that I am practicing more intentional awareness when they are moving behind me (he says after just admitting to being oblivious about Light’s whereabouts a moment ago).
That’s why I wrote, “practicing.”
.
.
Blown Snow
On Monday, I was plowing the driveway to clear the gradual build up of 1-to-2-inch accumulations from the previous couple of weeks and it was wonderfully calm. Yesterday, the latest two inch accumulation of powder on top was being blown across our fields while I wasn’t looking.
I took Delilah outside with me when I needed to do some cleanup shoveling that I had skipped after plowing on Monday. She patiently waited while I worked at each stop: up at the house in front of the garage doors, in front of the shop/garage, and down at the barn to clear in front of the big doors.
While I had the big doors open, I moved a few bales into the barn from the hay shed and then tidied things up in the barn. We were down to our last two bags of feed for the horses and I was anticipating delivery of more any day. I like to have things neatened up for the arrival of more feed.
Upon completion of all my intended tasks, I wanted to reward Delilah’s patience with a long walk to wherever she wanted to go. When we popped out of the woods behind the back pasture, I was surprised to find the path completely filled in by blown snow.
The whole time I had been shoveling around buildings I had been oblivious about how much wind was blowing and the open fields offered up a lot of snow to sweep into drifts.
I trudged through the deep snow, wishing I had my snowshoes on. But then, coming around the corner, the path was nothing but packed snow where no drifting had occurred.
I totally understand why some cultures have many words for snow.
The blown snow made a nice pattern around some stacked rocks near the labyrinth.
Later in the day, when we returned to the barn to set out the afternoon feeding for the horses, there were eleven new bags of feed freshly stacked on the pallets. There’d been a visit from the feed-fairy while we were up in the house having lunch.
.
.
Acting Foxy
I’m not sure what got into Delilah yesterday, but it was Valentine’s Day, after all. She was getting all foxy, pausing to hunt for out-of-sight prey beneath the snow during several of our walks around the property yesterday.
It’s hard for me to tell if she thinks something is lurking beneath the pristine snow cover because she can smell it or hear it. The part that looks so fox-like at the start is how she cocks her head and focuses her ears over the surface, waiting to pounce.
When she thinks the time is right, she pounces and buries her face into the snow.
Either she was getting false signals or the critters under the snow outsmarted her and got away. It wouldn’t be the first time. I’ve watched many little rodents make a mad dash escape out the back while Delilah is digging through the weeds for a prize.
In that photo she is searching at the edge of the wash of snow I had plowed off the driveway a short time earlier. We’ve had a series of 1 to 2 inch snowfalls and several days when wind has packed the snow into hard drifts and I hadn’t plowed for a couple of weeks.
Our driveway looks so nice cleaned up after days of having neglected it. Dare I say, it’s downright foxy!
.
.
Just Me
Starting today and lasting for a little over a week, it’s going to be just me managing the ranch as Cyndie is flying today to visit her mother in Florida. I’ve been through this solo routine many times but instead of that making it easier, I think the last few times have increasingly revealed how connected Cyndie and I have become at this point of our lives.
Throughout the last week, we have been watching the athletic Olympic performances available on NBC together. It won’t be the same all by myself. I have been frustrated over the number of events, especially hockey, we haven’t had access to that have been broadcast on USA network.
I will particularly miss her editing service for these blog posts. She continually provides helpful feedback on my writing that always makes my posts read better.
Tending to the animals is always half as much work when we share the duties. Now I only have Delilah to help me with the horses until Cyndie returns and what Delilah does down at the barn is never really all that helpful. Mostly, she starts barking a lot if she thinks the horses are misbehaving.
Delilah did a great job of alerting us about someone showing up at our front door yesterday. It was one of the local coyote hunters asking if they could cross our land during a hunt. I made sure to get his contact information this time, in case we have future evidence of the pests lurking on our land.
Surprisingly, Delilah didn’t get riled up over the sound of the hunting dogs cutting through our woods. Later, when I took her for an afternoon walk, she was very interested in all the new foot and paw prints in the snow. I heard a couple of gunshots while the hunt was active, but did not receive any word about whether they were successful or not.
It just eventually gets quiet, the pickup trucks disappear from the road, and the horses stop looking all spooked. At that point, I feel safe to take Delilah outside again.
Now it’s going to be quiet around the house for the next nine days.
Not that I’m counting.
.
.
Winter Leaves
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
Least Favorite
We are on the back side of one of my least favorite winter snow weather events this morning. Basically, I dislike it for the resulting conditions that make clearing the accumulation so annoying. It doesn’t make for pleasant conditions for animals that have to endure the tribulations of dealing with the wide range of precipitation, either.
It starts like this:
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
.
The temperature climbs well above freezing and a light mist of wetness falls to get everything good and wet. The warm temperature also starts to melt the snow already on the ground.
Next, big snow moves in and falls in gorgeous flakes that make the world look like every favorite winter snowscape scene you’ve ever witnessed.
That puts you in a gleeful state of mind that becomes a set up for the other shoe that is going to drop when it comes time to shovel or plow when the precipitation is over.
The wet snow sticks to every surface and paints trees with a beautiful white accent that makes the forest look like something from a fairy tale.
This is the time when the tide turns and the temperature begins to plummet while the wind kicks up to uncomfortable speeds. The flakes that aren’t already stuck solid to surfaces are whipped up into little missiles that embed themselves into every nook and cranny available to create a stucco concrete finish that would be the envy of many a cement craftsman.
Clearing the front steps is difficult without the aid of chemical assistance and sharpened heavy metal tools.
Alas, there is an excellent antidote for crummy weather conditions that experienced winter-hardened folk who live near destination restaurants can employ to compensate for any angst-inducing hassles of unfavorable snow conditions.
Last night, Cyndie and I had an early Valentine’s Day dinner at the Shady Grove restaurant just two miles from home and dined like royalty, finishing with our highly favored dessert treat that they expertly prepare.
With only seconds to spare before there was nothing left to show for it but a sticky doily, Cyndie snapped a photo of the remains of their salted chocolate caramel tart for posterity. My sugar ratio was definitely knocked way out of balance by the end of the day yesterday.
And that, my faithful readers, is how you go from a least-favorite to a most-favorite in just a few hundred words.
.
.
