Faith, Folklore, and Friends

It was all my Grandma's fault for up and dying right after she had paid to have the winter's coal delivered.   Everyone in the neighborhood heated their homes with wood, even the people we thought were rich.  It was what we had done since the first cabins were erected, and we didn't see any sense in changing as late as 1965. Wood was free and plentiful in those Tennessee hills, and almost everyone had a chainsaw by then. Grandma and Grandpa were getting on up in years, and it became difficult to lift the heavy firewood to put in the heater to heat their home. Someone they knew had a good pickup and a source of cheap coal, and with a little encouragement, they bought a used coal heater and had a winter's supply of coal delivered. Oh, it was so good!  They could get enough coal in a bucket to last for most days. Just a few pieces of the burning coal could  put out enough heat for them to stay comfortable.  No more piling enough firewood by the front door...

Sooooo, I'm just wondering how this got started.  My parents, even without the Weather Channel, always acknowledged it, and  hated the days the sun was out to make the groundhog's shadow. For most of the country, how hard is to to imagine winter lasting through the middle of March?  Even here in North Alabama, March sometimes brings snow and cold winds and gray, miserable days. Groundhog's Day is not a national holiday, but it appears on every calendar I checked.  It is cloudy here now, with predictions of big storms later today. Try and make it a good day, in spite of groundhogs and pending storms.

I wrote about persimmons  here  a while back, but here is another perspective, surely more accurate than mine,  on  winter predictions using persimmon seed . Or, if you don't trust persimmons,  the trusty  woolly bear caterpillars  might tell you how high the heating bills will run. An infallible guide could be as simple as  watching your cat. I don't know what winter will bring, but here is a prediction I'm pretty sure about: it won't get here until after we have enjoyed October.

~Florence Main Street photo                           I do not like the cold North breeze or temps low enough to freeze the pipes, the plants, and the parts of motor cars that make them start. I do not like the freezing rain that makes the roads a major pain to try to get to work and school. I do not like it, and I’m no fool. I do not like the mushy snow. It doesn’t set my heart aglow. Instead, it just makes me mean as I pine for something green. I do not like the low, gray sky. Sometimes, it makes me want to cry when I think of all the blue skies gone and weeks of winter yet to come. I do like the summer, humid and hot; long lazy days and temps that do not fall below seventy, even at night! Hurry up, Summer! It’s nowhere in sight. ~ Wanda Stricklin Robertson

God loves to look at us, and loves it when we will look back at Him. Even when we try to run away form our troubles... God will find us, bless us, even when we feel most alone. . unsure... God will find a way to let us know that He is with us in this place, wherever we are. ~Kathleen Norris   I thought we all needed some sunshine and roses on this dark, dreary winter day.  Enjoy!

Ice on blue, and then the sun. Winter can't hide the beauty around us. It is cold, but the sun is shining.  Go out and find some beauty today, even if the winter is growing long in your life.

The sun came out this morning for the first time in many days.  I bundled up and ventured to the garden to see how things were getting along. Apparently, not so well. These turnip greens and kale are showing the weight of winter, their heads hanging. Winter has had the same affect on me.  However, because it is Friday and because I love y'all, I won't post a selfie. The weatherman promises temperatures in the fifties for a few days.  You wouldn't believe how excited that makes me.

Sonnet 97 by William Shakespeare How like a winter hath my absence been From thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year! What freezings have I felt, what dark days seen! What old December’s bareness everywhere! And yet this time remov’d was summer’s time, The teeming autumn, big with rich increase, Bearing the wanton burthen of the prime, Like widow’d wombs after their lords’ decease: Yet this abundant issue seem’d to me But hope of orphans and unfather’d fruit; For summer and his pleasures wait on thee, And thou away, the very birds are mute; Or if they sing, ’tis with so dull a cheer That leaves look pale, dreading the winter’s near.

Never be in a hurry; do everything quietly and  in a calm spirit. Do not lose your inner peace  for anything whatsoever, even if your whole  world seems upset. ~ Saint Francis de Sales

The winter solstice has always been special to me as a barren darkness that gives birth to a verdant future beyond imagination, a time of pain and withdrawal that produces something joyfully inconceivable, like a monarch butterfly masterfully extracting itself from the confines of its cocoon, bursting forth into unexpected glory. ~Gary Zukav