Risk-taking and fear

Tough questions from...

( The Friday Five )

More icicles

Before I get to the photos I shot today, here are a couple strange ones left on my camera from Wednesday evening, taken immediately outside my front door. For those of you familiar with Ontario, this is Highway 7, which I have to cross to get to the river.

( One more )

Vernal surge

The flock of house sparrows that haunts Florence Lane is restless, too.

Sometime around Groundhog Day I always get hit with a surge of energy. I felt warning rumbles last week, but it arrived full blast when I got out of bed yesterday. It results from increasing daylight. First thing in the morning I want to bake banana muffins instead of huddling in front of my computer screen. My libido increases. I long to dig my fingers into soft earth and see green things grow. My concentration and self-confidence improve. I am less disposed to sadness and complacency, more inclined toward impatience and dissatisfaction. It is disconcerting, but now that I understand the cycle, it comes as a relief.

It emphasizes how sluggish I have felt since October. I resist calling this a disorder. It's entirely natural. The change of seasons affects the behaviour of practically every animal that lives in these latitudes. Why not humans? If Western society could accommodate it, perhaps it wouldn't make so many people unhappy. How I shall shape my career around it is another question.

A few days of temperatures around freezing have drawn a golden blush into the twigs of the old black willows. The maples remain demurely grey.

In honour of changing my user name to vaneramos, here is a new image of the Eramosa River.



( One more of the river, and a self-portrait )