Quote of the Day (Hal Borland, on Why December ‘Is Neither Bleak Nor Colorless’)

“True, December can be raw and cold and its days sometimes are dark, but it is neither bleak nor colorless. Go outdoors soon after sun-up, which now comes late, and even on a lowering day you probably will find a frosty scene of dazzling beauty. If the day is clear it can be a world transformed by frost or snow, newly created, fragile as spun glass, ephemeral as the passing hour.”— American writer, journalist and naturalist Hal Borland (1900-1978), Twelve Moons of the Year, edited by Barbara Dodge Borland (1979)

Though the sun had not yet come up, I awoke this morning to see a thin layer of snow on the ground. Quite a contrast with last winter, when, a local weatherman said last night, snow did not arrive in New York City until February 1.

Let’s see what happens this winter. Unlike when I was a kid, I don’t look forward to snow—I have to shovel it and drive in it, rather than digging out my sled and sliding down a hill in my neighborhood. But I also know that a year with little to no snow in this part of the country is a sign of something wrong.

(I took the image accompanying this post exactly four years ago today, in Overpeck County Park, not far from where I live in Bergen County, NJ. That December really was bleak, but for reasons unrelated to the landscape. It was, you might recall, when COVID-19 raged and fear stalked the land.)

Quote of the Day (Carl Safina, on Early December in Eastern Long Island)

“With a real frost in the air and a mad-dog bite to the wind, winter is no longer just a concept. A new moon has the tide kicked way up. Waves acting like winners at a poker table greedily pull piles of beach into their lap. On the south side, waterfront home owners are finding the water much closer. Many have lost up to a staggering twenty feet of land this autumn, and in places, sloping dunes that once led gently toward the beach have become ten-foot-high bluffs. Swept-away beach stairs and walkways have gotten hurled back at the crumbled dunes up and down the beach. And it’s not even officially winter yet; such has been the strange tantrum of a mostly warm autumn.”—American ecologist, nature writer—and MacArthur “genius” Fellow—Dr. Carl Safina, The View from Lazy Point: A Natural Year in an Unnatural World (2011)

(Photo of Carl Safina taken by Carl’s Crew on Feb. 7, 2011.)

Photo of the Day: Drizzly Dusk, Late December

Late this afternoon, I thought I saw a window of opportunity for walking around in Overpeck County Park, not far from me in Bergen County, NJ. As it happened, that window was small and closing fast. By the time I pulled into the parking lot, virtually every car had its lights on, and then, halfway around the park, drizzle began to settle on my shoulders. Still, there was enough time for photo-taking, including this shot.

Photo of the Day: Symphony Plaza, New York City

“Symphony Plaza” is a small, public space on 56^th Street and Eighth Avenue in Manhattan. Here, as darkness slowly gathered in the late afternoon today, a small group of people sat outside, enjoying the Christmas lights and the unusually balmy weather for mid-December. Clad in a windbreaker (something I can't recall doing before this late in the year), I came upon this scene and snapped this image.