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PITTSBURG —
I hope the new year will give us some rain, enough to bring the rivers back to some kind of normalcy. But if it is true that you reap what you sow, extreme weather might be something we have to learn to live with. I’m not smart enough to know what has caused the changes in the earth, but some really terrible things have happened over the past few years.
The suffering isn’t confined to large metropolitan areas. Six years ago in February, we endured one of the awfullest nights I could imagine. . I remember that night when in the dark stillness created by the absence of electricity; I listened to a pouring rain outside, and the crashing of tree limbs, laden with ice. The temperature at the time was 29 degrees and falling, and the rain was just pelting down. I kept the fireplace roaring, but slept little as the cracking and crashing continued through the night.
The next morning at first light, I awakened and looked out upon what seemed to be unbelievable devastation. There was a coating of ice that looked to be an inch thick, limbs broken everywhere, small shrubs, trees and bushes just flattened. More limbs were continuing to crash down, and I prayed that my Labradors were still alive in their kennels. It was 17 degrees outside that morning and only 50 degrees inside. I bundled up, built up the fire again and tried to make some coffee on a propane camp stove.
The sun was trying to come up, and the world was a dazzling white and silver. Birds flitted here and there, cardinals and titmice grouped around my feeders, trying to figure out how to get to the food. I started broadcasting birdseed across the ice on my front and back porch, and out into the lawn. In days to come, hundreds of birds fed there. I saw four old turkeys easing up along the fringes of timber behind my house, all humped over and bedraggled and about as depressed looking as I was.
I went out to my kennels to get my Labs some fresh water, and a falling limb, heavy with ice, narrowly missed me. I had to use hot water just to melt open the frozen gate latches. My wooded ridge top looked like some kind of winter war-zone. Right then, with my face stiff with cold and my fingers numb, I looked up and promised God that I would never again complain about a hot summer!
For another two weeks, my family struggled against cold, ice-covered, difficult conditions. There was no electricity for about 10 days, and I kept the fireplace going just to keep the temperature in the fifties at night, sleeping under piles of blankets, rising before dawn to get things done. I felt a kinship with our early ancestors. I was a little tougher, and a little closer to the earth than I have been for a while.
I hope the new year will give us some rain, enough to bring the rivers back to some kind of normalcy. But if it is true that you reap what you sow, extreme weather might be something we have to learn to live with. I’m not smart enough to know what has caused the changes in the earth, but some really terrible things have happened over the past few years.
The suffering isn’t confined to large metropolitan areas. Six years ago in February, we endured one of the awfullest nights I could imagine. . I remember that night when in the dark stillness created by the absence of electricity; I listened to a pouring rain outside, and the crashing of tree limbs, laden with ice. The temperature at the time was 29 degrees and falling, and the rain was just pelting down. I kept the fireplace roaring, but slept little as the cracking and crashing continued through the night.
The next morning at first light, I awakened and looked out upon what seemed to be unbelievable devastation. There was a coating of ice that looked to be an inch thick, limbs broken everywhere, small shrubs, trees and bushes just flattened. More limbs were continuing to crash down, and I prayed that my Labradors were still alive in their kennels. It was 17 degrees outside that morning and only 50 degrees inside. I bundled up, built up the fire again and tried to make some coffee on a propane camp stove.
The sun was trying to come up, and the world was a dazzling white and silver. Birds flitted here and there, cardinals and titmice grouped around my feeders, trying to figure out how to get to the food. I started broadcasting birdseed across the ice on my front and back porch, and out into the lawn. In days to come, hundreds of birds fed there. I saw four old turkeys easing up along the fringes of timber behind my house, all humped over and bedraggled and about as depressed looking as I was.
I went out to my kennels to get my Labs some fresh water, and a falling limb, heavy with ice, narrowly missed me. I had to use hot water just to melt open the frozen gate latches. My wooded ridge top looked like some kind of winter war-zone. Right then, with my face stiff with cold and my fingers numb, I looked up and promised God that I would never again complain about a hot summer!
For another two weeks, my family struggled against cold, ice-covered, difficult conditions. There was no electricity for about 10 days, and I kept the fireplace going just to keep the temperature in the fifties at night, sleeping under piles of blankets, rising before dawn to get things done. I felt a kinship with our early ancestors. I was a little tougher, and a little closer to the earth than I have been for a while.
