Time Flies

It seems I never get around to posting stuff anymore...and certainly not like I used to!  Even content-wise I feel I have slipped a long way from where this blog was back when I was in NY.  Partly (mostly) this is due to time.  At my last job, since we were closing down, I had plenty of time to research and write.  Now my days are full at work - busy busy busy doing a bi-monthly newsletter, working on interpretive plans, doing weekly programs at the local middle school, attending meetings, etc. etc. etc.  I don't have internet at home (can't afford it), so I have to make do at work or at hotspots on my days off (which doesn't happen very much - I do so miss the Crandall Library in Glens Falls).

Right now, however, I have misplaced my camera cable, so I am unable to download photographs.  Photographs of exciting things like the annual Christmas Bird Count this last Saturday.

And I also neglected to post a major milestone:  one year, one week and one day ago I moved to Michigan.  Two days later I started this new job.  It's been a whole year!  Tempus fugit!!!  Sometimes it feels like it can't possibly be a whole year already, while at other times I feel like I've been here so much longer.

With a whole year behind me now, I can no longer take advantage of "I'm the new person."  I've now seen and done just about everything here, so there are no more excuses.  Time to forge ahead and make my mark.

Today also marks another year completed in my own life - and for the first time, a birthday doesn't really seem like such a big deal.  It was starting to feel that way the last couple of years, but this year it is truly so.  Is this a sign of having finally grown up?  Hm....can't have THAT happen!

But it is the Winter Solstice - a time of celebration around the world.  I guess officially it isn't the Winter Solstice until 12:30 tonight, EST (or tomorrow morning, if one wants to be really correct).  In my mind, however, December 21st will always be the Winter Solstice, just as March 21st will always be the Vernal Equinox, June 21st the Summer Solstice and September 21st the Autumnal Equinox. 

I really kind of like the idea of this being the longest night of the year, where the community would gather around a roaring fire and keep it burning (Yule log) until the sun rose the next morning, ensuring the turn of the seasons and that light would return to this good earth.  I imagine this was really a lot more significant in those far northern climes where daylight at this time of year only lasts an hour or two.  While I may begrudge the morning darkness (I hate getting up before 5:30 and not seeing the sky lighten until after 8:00 AM), we still have some daylight here until almost 5:30 in the evening.  A wee bit more light than we had in the Adirondacks.

So, enjoy your holiday this season, whatever it may be.  And when I find my camera cable, we will once more be back in business here.

Cheers!