a little dream for a cold day...

Like most of the rest of the country, the Dallas suburbs are in a deep freeze.

Our skies are clear and as blue as a mountain lake, but the wind is howling

and it is so very cold! So my thoughts stray to this scene... the coast of beautiful

Tortola in the British Virgin Islands. I know that today it is in the 80s there (it

always is), the water is calm and the sand is white. I have walked this beach... and will again.

It eases the chill of this winter day to remember the quiet beauty of this place

and to know it is there, warm and tranquil and I will return to this enchanted place.

I will.

contrasts...

I am a lover of sunshine, of aqua seas and swaying palms. I love warmth and sand and azure skies... but I am making peace with winter. Even I must admit that a less vibrant landscape also has a certain beauty. Winter is quieter, slower, all tucked in, waiting.

I prefer winter and fall, when you feel the bone structure of the landscape - the loneliness of it, the dead feeling of winter. Something waits beneath it, the whole story doesn't show.

~Andrew Wyeth
I cannot say I prefer winter, but I am appreciating the merits of this season of reflection.

And of course...
O, wind,
If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?
~Percy Bysshe Shelley

old man winter

Amazingly we are having our second little snow storm in one week here in the Dallas suburbs!

Our pansies have been sweetly "sugared" and that marvelous hush that comes with snowfall has arrived. Our snow will be gone tomorrow, but it has been so pretty to watch the big, cottony flakes dash against the windows while a fire burned in our fireplace and a pot of chili simmered on the stove.

Hope things are cozy wherever you might be.

Stay warm.

xoxo~Dale

It snowed and snowed,

the whole world over,

Snow swept the world from end to end.

A candle burned on the table;

A candle burned.
~Boris Pasternak
Doctor Zhivago