Winter Visions: Angel in the Snow / Flowers on Ice

“Do not be dismayed by the brokenness of the world. All things break. And all things can be mended. Not with time, as they say, but with intention. So go. Love intentionally, extravagantly, unconditionally. The broken world waits in darkness for the light that is you.” - L.R. Knost.

It was another cold start. In the morning, my husband brought in some ice from one of the outdoor water bowls. I thought it would be fun to do a photo shoot. He suggested flowers (our osteospermum is still blooming indoors now in three shades), and so I gave it a try.

I tucked the flowers INSIDE the icy shell, and took some shots: flowers against a blue frisbee, flowers against a clear bowl, flowers in the dark lit up with a small flashlight, and flowers arranged around the bowl almost looking like some really odd winter-meets-summer perversion of jello salad! The very last item is what you may see in the extras.

One of the fun things to do is to take strange pictures and then let people with creative minds comment on them. On one of the flashlight shots, my friend Becky said, and I quote: This picture reminds me of the pot of petunias that appears out of nowhere in "The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy." It seems to be a side-effect of the Infinite Improbability Drive in the spaceship Heart of Gold. And so there you have it. NOW you know what you're looking at!

My husband had a sudden hankering for a steak dinner, so we (against my advice, for I warned him it would be VERY crowded on a weekend afternoon a few weeks prior to Christmas) went into town to the Texas Roadhouse for just that. Of course (surprise surprise!), guess what: it WAS very crowded and busy. Everything we had was tasty but we waited for more than a half-hour for our food.

On the way back home, he dropped me off in the Barrens, where I checked out my favorite pond. It is hunting season now, and so I had to walk a blood trail in, which always grosses me out, though I ought to be used to it. (What do I mean by blood trail? It's the red blood on the snow that you see when hunters drag dead deer back to their cars. And yes, it's a thing you should expect to see when you go walking in the gamelands in hunting season.)

So yes, it's still hunting season, and YES, you should still be wearing your blaze orange in the woods, to be safe. My pond was tiny, and covered in snow, but there's a big melt coming, and so I suspect it will be much more full again very soon.

As I walked back home in the growing dusk, the sun started to fall from the sky, down low among the trees. I could see the ice shining like gold. I could almost hear TAPS playing wistfully in my heart: Day is done, gone the sun, from the lakes, from the hills, from the sky. All is well. Safely rest. God is nigh.

The last bit of sun fell upon some milkweed along the road. It's fluffy and white but there were almost no seeds on the upper part of it. I looked at it, and I saw it as an angel in the snow. So here is my double wintry blip for this day: an angel in the snow, and flowers on ice.

Now, I am a big fan of angels, and there are quite a few angel songs I like. Let me give you two of them, for good measure. First is Calling All Angels, by Jane Siberry, with k.d. lang (this is the remix version). Second is Seven Spanish Angels, by Jamey Johnson and Alison Krauss. 

And for the flower photo in the extras, I've got Barbra Streisand and Neil Diamond, with You Don't Bring Me Flowers, from the 1980 Grammys. I laughed to think that my husband brought me the perfect morning gift. No, it wasn't the flowers; it was the ICE. I am a girl who loves a gift of ice! Now, what does that say about ME? Back to the song: I've read a number of stories about this performance. Most of all, that this was the first time they performed the song together live. Barbra was nervous, and Neil told her - Just keep your eyes on ME. The performance, well, it's sheer perfection. Enjoy!!!