Fire and Ice

As a rule, I don’t want to wish my life away, and so I’m trying to be patient about this neverending winter, but we’ve had snow on the ground now since Christmas, numerous snowstorms, freezing rain, and long nights of below zero temperatures. It’s hard to walk anywhere without slipping and sliding. I’ve fallen once, and had snow slide off a metal roof onto my head – both times in front on my coworkers. Kinda embarrassing.

Everyone around here is getting grumpy about the weather. In fact, here are the only residents of northeast Kansas who aren’t complaining.

In order to go out and take pictures, Harland and I have to dress in 10 – 15 pounds of  movement-impeding clothing. Take a look at Harland last weekend.

But I’m trying to focus on the beauty of winter, and in particular the contradiction of the sun’s fire and ice’s hard coldness.

When we had freezing rain last week, it encrusted every surface, but despite sub-zero temperatures, the sun’s warmth caused a partial melting. And now, it appears that a sculptor has been at work.

Another sculptor at work is the wind. It picks up the snow and carries it across the fields depositing it in drifts with knife edge peaks.

With at least 4 more weeks of winter here, we’ll all have to just continue shoveling, dressing like we live in the arctic, and try not to notice how much the heat is running in our homes. After all, it doesn’t do any good to complain, and spring gets closer every day.

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——–> UP NEXT: Turkeys in the snow – up close and personal.

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