Christmas Eve Dusting
We’re having a white Christmas after all.
12/26 – More ice than snow, the slow moisture is welcome this dry season, but this is bad weather nonetheless: dangerous to walk or God forbid drive and heavy branches droop to the snapping point. The witchhazel is splayed open outside the window and all the boxwoods are frozen. Night comes on. I pity the animals who must endure it. Surely all the people are inside somewhere.
We had a flicker of the lights earlier this afternoon and prudently filled the bathtub with water which usually inoculates us from a power outage. John has a 5 gallon water jug and various containers filled with water in reserve in the outdoor closet.
Friends in town worry about us when we lose electricity but I think we fare better than a lot of urban people who are totally dependent on it. We can cook with gas and have a wood stove, can haul water from the cistern across the creek when we have to. During the summer derecho when we were without power that whole hot, hot week, we could still douse ourselves in the evening with watering cans and buckets out in the grass. We can pee outside, too, if water becomes scarce for flushing, which is a great advantage.
12/27 – A lot of melt today, a pine branch down on the drive from the ice, but no damage. The creek is running happily and the front gravel walk is slushy. It was good to see blue sky.
12/28 – Saw ice on the hills driving home south from Charlottesville this afternoon. More precip forecasted – ice or snow or sleety rain. The land drinks up the moisture, the eaves drip but I believe we’re still technically in a drought.
We will see what the new year brings.