Winter Solstice.
I’m not sure that nature wears a watch, and the increasing impact of climate change suggests that the traditional calendar of seasons has gone out the window too. Nonetheless we humans like to ascribe dates and times to many things – and so it is that winter begins at 9.47pm (or is it 9.48pm 🧐) this evening.
Seconds more daylight tomorrow. Then minutes more. Then the Spring Equinox on 20th March (at 3.33pm apparently), and the clocks change on the 26th March.
Getting outside in the dark and cold is good for us physically and mentally but also it allows us to see that nature doesn’t hide indoors under a blanket.
I’ve been privileged to see three mountain hare in the last month – the first two were ‘half and half’, but the last one had moulted in to its white winter pelage. I sat in the lee of a dry stone wall as snow fell, and poured a slug of tea to toast the hare with.
Looking forward (when i do actually finish work) to moving about outdoors at a slower pace and taking time to pop a brew on and watch what nature is up to.
‘Time is nature’s way of keeping everything from happening at once’. — Woody Allen