Each day I look out the window expecting to see the world blanketed in whiteness and regret that I have not brought the deicer and snow scraper upstairs, while I grab the myriad of things I need to bring into my home. And yet, the quintessential winter blizzard is still not here.
One fears global warming, but I can remember one winter, as a child on the east coast, when the snow came pouring down in April. Buckets and Buckets full piled up on the streets, after the snow equipment went by. Some mysterious drift of air currents displayed the uunpredictability of weather. Has my longing for the longer falls of the East Coast culminated in this leafless greyness? Did someone up there listen to me? This is not exactly what I had in mind.
The lake near home has changed its mind about providing a place to skate and ski three times over already, as if to tell us that we are all so undecided right now. Winter does not know whether to show its face or not. I expect that it will rampage our streets suddenly just when we have given up--a surprise attack sending everyone home from school, have us pulling out the winter wear still stuck at the back of the closet and be courted by children making snowmen, while others decorate it with trails from sleighs and bounced up and down with rubberized feet.
But, what if this is global warming? Are we in winter in a different way and what is the cost of not knowing? And, what of this spring and summer with the bugs not really killed off. Will the bulbs giving of themself be frozen by a late snow and will there be drought?
My kitchen is small. Where do I store the paper, the plastic, the metal, and I throw away another load not knowing what to do about it. The people running and walking around the lake are they thinking about it too?
One fears global warming, but I can remember one winter, as a child on the east coast, when the snow came pouring down in April. Buckets and Buckets full piled up on the streets, after the snow equipment went by. Some mysterious drift of air currents displayed the uunpredictability of weather. Has my longing for the longer falls of the East Coast culminated in this leafless greyness? Did someone up there listen to me? This is not exactly what I had in mind.
The lake near home has changed its mind about providing a place to skate and ski three times over already, as if to tell us that we are all so undecided right now. Winter does not know whether to show its face or not. I expect that it will rampage our streets suddenly just when we have given up--a surprise attack sending everyone home from school, have us pulling out the winter wear still stuck at the back of the closet and be courted by children making snowmen, while others decorate it with trails from sleighs and bounced up and down with rubberized feet.
But, what if this is global warming? Are we in winter in a different way and what is the cost of not knowing? And, what of this spring and summer with the bugs not really killed off. Will the bulbs giving of themself be frozen by a late snow and will there be drought?
My kitchen is small. Where do I store the paper, the plastic, the metal, and I throw away another load not knowing what to do about it. The people running and walking around the lake are they thinking about it too?
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