Wind back to February

We left mid-February not expecting warm - we had planned to go and then reports were of unusual coldness in South Carolina and impending snow storms (on top of several inches previously deposited) in our town....we decided to go anyway after much debating and initially deciding it would be foolish to go.  But then we realized how bummed we would be if we stayed home and decided if Jet Blue was flying, so were we - so the morning we left South Carolina declared a state of emergency - and a day or so in - they got nearly twenty inches of snow back home in New York.  They were snowbound - and we had no snow, very little ice, just cold.  Well, more like COLD. 

Cold with palm trees.  Cold with people not used to cold or ice or snow so what seemed like nothing to us was unreal to them.  Everything was shut down the day we came in except the airport, hotels, and restaurants.  People were walking around in layers of light clothes - we were from snowbound NY, we had snowboots, parkas, polertec!  So we were toasty even though now when we ask about the weather in our house and if it is particularly chilly with a bite in it, we refer to that as "You know, like South Carolina cold". 

The lighthouse out on Hunting Island.  The outlines of the old buildings from a distance looked like bocce courts to me.  Yeah, um, no.  It was beautiful everywhere we went.  Going places off season is nothing new for us, we have gone to Cape Cod in early icy April (you have no crowds, great heated hotel pools, and stark gorgeous scenery - also clam chowder never tastes better than when it's cold).
We went to Maine in a post season very brisk October - and instead of summer tourists we had pretty great Halloween decorations, no crowds, and ...well, clam chowder, encore).  Florida in July (not as bad as you think), North Carolina in August (again, not uncomfortable).What did we get in South Carolina?  Amazing juxtapositions like peonies blooming out of frozen dirt, Spanish moss frosted.  Seeing how southerners rise to the occasion of inclement weather with grace and patience.  And the onion soup in the Charleston French Restaurant after walking in cold rain was divine.

great freezing cold walk down a long pier - the Nature Center at the end was closing but looked like it had some very nice offerings. 

Another couple were walking on the pier with my frozen husband and myself, they were kind enough to call us over as we were leaving to point out this little fellow in the marsh grass hunting for his supper.  They were from Virginia and told us tales of the frozen weather there...well, here it is late April and I have the house heater on so I guess we are still not out of it yet.   Bet it's a lot warmer now though in South Carolina.

Sunday Quote

Life began for me when I ceased to admire and began to remember.

- Willa Cather

Homebodies and Adventurers

http://www.nationalgeographic.com/adventure/adventure-travel/europe/russia-reindeer-gretel-ehrlich.html

Enjoyed this article about reindeer people.  Interesting lives, these people and the woman writing the piece, the photographer.  Makes me question what makes some explorers of the greater world and adventurers and what makes some interior explorers and not venture too far types? 

Very late Sunday Quote....or emphatic suggestion

The Orchid Show

The Orchid Show at the New York Botanical Gardens.....long lines (we missed the super long ones, thankfully) and the pleasure of being among so much green after such a long winter.

I would like to live in a conservatory. Wouldn't that be lovely?  I would add birds to mine, and small green lizards like the kind that roam the Charleston cemeteries and pulse along the cement walls in Florida.

I would not, however, wish to fall on this large stalk of mysterious but painful-looking greenery.

Sunday Quote

"If, of thy mortal goods, thou art bereft,
And from thy slender store two loaves
alone to thee are left,
Sell one & from the dole,
Buy Hyacinths to feed the soul"

- Muslihuddin Sadi, 13th Century Persian Poet

Quack

This is a giant hedge in Norwalk, Ct.  Just brilliant.  Next to it is a bunny hedge, quite good, but not quite as duck fabulous.  At the other end of the property was yet another giant duck hedge.  These people who live here are brilliant.  Wouldn't you love to be their neighbor?  I imagine they are quite fun.

Sunday Quote

If I were asked to give what I consider the most useful bit of advice for all humanity, it would be this:  Expect trouble as an inevitable part of life, and when it comes, hold your head high.  Look it squarely in the eye, and say, "I will be bigger than you.  You cannot defeat me."  Then, repeat to yourself the most comforting words of all, "this too will pass".

- Ann Landers

Close of winter walk

Look closely.  Do you see the prints on the ice?  Geese, I imagine, plodding over the frozen lake daydreaming of warm skies and fat little bugs and green weeds.

Citizens of the small lakes (as we call them, truly they are large ponds I think).  Tired of winter as we are.

Doesn't this blue sky hint of warmer days?  Yet the end of winter has its own beauty, the way the earth always insistantly reminds us that despite our digging in, everything changes constantly around us.

the little birds in the reeds and bushes were making quite a racket.  Nearby at the high school despite the cold, the kids were out with coaches practicing sports, running with an ease and grace as I stumbled around hard earth that shifted to mud slops that hid mangled tree limbs...this would make a fine obstacle course, coaches!

Across the way the little library looking very remote in the wilderness except for the busy road that fronts it.  The park still bears the ravages of the previous year when I did my first Spring walk and was so sad to see the big willow gone, so many other trees gone, but just two days ago we saw a swan and are hoping to see it return.  Come Spring perhaps.