The colours at this time of year are wonderfully dark. All variations of black and brown with only the occasional frosty white for a fringe. There is a wan green but it’s limp lack of chlorophyll offers a pitifully muddy contrast with it’s richness at the height of spring. Moreover this insipid, underexposed carpet is only really seen on the verges of roads and in the occasional pasture, empty of cows.
Green isn’t thought of as a glorious colour but when it is almost absent it doesn’t seem an unreasonable description, thinking back, or ahead to more productive times. The evergreens are dark enough in shadows cast by the low January sun to be almost black.
Normally this is a depressing time but this year the coldness has provided a surprising boost to the system. We rarely see proper winters. Winters with killing temperatures that punish the unwary, the unprepared, the weak. Winters of tradition. There has been little snow but the flat land of the East rarely attracts it. As usual there is plenty of wind and this year it feels as if the full force of the Siberian Winter has been blowing our way.
Interestingly there don’t seem to be many takers for the birdseed in the garden. I suppose hibernation must be in full swing, or the birds have already died. My friend the robin is absent. I hope he makes it through the far side. Even the blackbirds, normally reliable, seem to have disappeared. Time will tell. Spring has a way of fixing things.
The beauty of a long hard winter is the contrast it provides with spring when it finally arrives. This year I am not in a hurry. I am content with having to sit in in front of the fire, or to wrap up well when going out. Sunday afternoons spent in the kitchen, spicy vegetable soup with rustic brown bread and butter, crumpets, ginger cake and tea. Then a roast dinner in the evening before settling in for the night.