12/01/18

December, welcome! We've been waiting eleven
months for you to arrive . . . and yeah, I'll admit
it . . . sometimes I read the end of mysteries first
so I don't have to be nervous the entire book! So,
December . . . decorate the tree, mail the x-mas
cards, wrap and hide the pressies, start thinking
about the menu, forgive and forget . . . so many
things to get done before the day actually arrives!
And not to forget, but are you a Christmas Eve kind
of person or are you the actual, wait until Christmas
morning, type? You'll laugh, but I solved that little
problem by celebrating Yule instead . . . December
21st, first day of winter. So, what is Yule exactly?
Yes, I know, we grew up hearing the terms Yule
and Yuletide greetings, and some even used them
interchangeably with Christmas and other sundry
phrases. Yule is actually one of the eight Pagan
holidays, you know . . . along with the first days of
spring, summer and fall, May day and Halloween?!
So, whichever be your persuasion, Merry Christmas,
Happy Hanukkah, Sweet Saturnalia and Yule tidings
of great joy to you! Bottom line . . . long live December!

holidays await
so love me some december
wheres the mistletoe

12/01/18

Smiling as I read this, for its own sweet sake, and also because it got me thinking about my own "big day".  It's the Christmas Bird Count, always on the third Saturday in December, and the one day all winter when I have visitors. This will be my 30th. It begins around 4:00 a.m. when I wrap myself in a warm blanket and sit outside for two frigid hours listening for owls (three species last year). Then I shower and put out plates of food and people begin to arrive around 7:30 - the count leader always with a jar of local honey for me. We spend the morning tooling around our designated circle in search of birds, sometimes in sub-zero temperatures, then return to the house where lunch and cordials await by the wood stove. Once we're warm and sated, we depart for another area a few miles away and race to beat the setting sun. We return to the wood stove to make sure that we've counted all the birds (24 species is a respectable count), and to retell of the ones that surprised us (one year 100 Bohemian Waxwings eating juniper berries). The tally will be delivered at a chili dinner where competitive birders drip with jealousy, disbelief or disappointment. All this feeds into over 100 years of records that are painting a stark picture of how climate change is affecting birds. Other than that, it's a wonderful celebration of nature with good food and old friends...what more could a person ask for?

~Audrey Boag