This morning at 4:30 (yes I got up an hour earlier than usual) the only sound I heard was the furnace kicking in, again and again, cycle after cycle. Not much action; morning twilight was an hour away. As I turned on the coffee, my eyes rested on thermometer, which seemed to be at very steady zero degrees. Have you ever noticed the range that an out-of-door thermometer can register? Well, first time for me: + 120 degrees to -40 degrees. Who needs that range? in the summer, people in the southwest might live in +120 degree heat, but where does anyone inhabit -40? Maybe on top of Mt. Washington, but who really lives there?
Out on the deck, I waited for dawn, just sitting there sipping coffee, while the mergansers, who also get up at 4:30, paraded up and back in front of the cottage. They moved rather randomly, or so it seemed, in a couple of distinguishable groups, but I’d have to say they were one community. Where are they going? Do they know each other? Questions without answers, at least to the solitary observer silently sipping coffee…but I can learn something. Although they don’t swim in a row, these ducks seem to know what they are doing, and they are only minding their own business.
By noon my free-range thermometer registered eleven, so, remembering my keys, I bundled up, and set out for the lighthouse. Invigorating but not frostbiting cold until I began the return home. I’ll just report that I felt the wind chill factor, and leave it at that.
Out on the deck, I waited for dawn, just sitting there sipping coffee, while the mergansers, who also get up at 4:30, paraded up and back in front of the cottage. They moved rather randomly, or so it seemed, in a couple of distinguishable groups, but I’d have to say they were one community. Where are they going? Do they know each other? Questions without answers, at least to the solitary observer silently sipping coffee…but I can learn something. Although they don’t swim in a row, these ducks seem to know what they are doing, and they are only minding their own business.
By noon my free-range thermometer registered eleven, so, remembering my keys, I bundled up, and set out for the lighthouse. Invigorating but not frostbiting cold until I began the return home. I’ll just report that I felt the wind chill factor, and leave it at that.
