Winter’s enchantment

On January 12th, winter finally hit with a vengeance. A week earlier, we were playing outside in 60F weather. I noticed a few daffodil sprouts peeking though the mulch. I sat outside and read a magazine.

Friday changed all that. It began as rain but became obvious by 4pm that getting off the road as quickly as possible would be the primary order of business.

By Saturday morning, we woke up to winter. All 18 inches of it. Winter storm Gia was making her appearance known.

The first fall of snow is not only an event but it is a magical event. You go to bed in one kind of world and wake up to find yourself in another quite different, and if this is not enchantment, where is it to be found? ~J. B. Priestly

Yes, at 7am it was an enchanting site. Snow, slowly and silently falling in the early morning hours, was blanketing everything with newness.

The wind crooned softly as it dusted the snow against the windows, wrapping them in a thick and fluffy cotton blanket.
~Soheir Khashoggi, Nadia’s Song

The snow doesn’t give a soft white damn whom it touches.
~E.E. Cummings

A snow plow had already made it through our subdivision, but Mother Nature was quickly reclaiming the street. For a short time, it seemed like we were suspended in time.

Snowflakes are one of nature’s most fragile things, but just look what they can do when they stick together.
~Vesta M. Kelly

And, boy oh boy, did they ever stick together! Every cedar and pine tree was literally bowing to the power created by those little snowflakes.

The snow was endless, a heavy blanket on the outdoors; it had a way about it. A beauty. But I knew that, like many things, beauty could be deceiving.
~Cambria Hebert, Whiteout

Beauty is deceiving. As lovely as our winter wonderland appeared, it was not without casualties and fatalities. A number of tree limbs…trees that had survived decades of winter weather….surrendered to the weight of this snow and snapped. Power lines went down and more than 8,000 homes were without power for the majority of the day and night. We were fortunate our power was not interrupted and we were able to comfortably shelter in place during the worst of it. My heart went out to those not so fortunate, and to those working to clear roads and restore power.

The latest leaves are shaken from the oaks and alders; the snow-laden pines, with drooping boughs, look like barbed arrows aimed at the sky
~John Muir, Yosemite in Winter

It was truly an awesome site. And just another one of nature’s reminders that we are really not in control of anything.

Hope your Tuesday is a happy one. Ours is happier since the temps are rising above freezing the next few days. Just in time for another possible “snow event” next weekend! Blog hopping today with Comedy Plus and Peabea’s Photos n Scribbles.