Winter Storms, Winter Weather

Heavy Snow, Power Outages, and Some January Photos (Mostly of Snow)

Snow bound the earth

in winter-tumults. The skies grew cold

with hard hail-showers, and ice and frost…

-”Andreas,” Vercelli Book (from the Old English, included in Eleanor Parker’s masterful Winters in the World)

Blizzard

The evening of January 12, just after dark but a few hours since the snow started falling in earnest, we heard an amplified pop-bang from outside. A second or two later, the power went out. A collective groan then from all family members; we know how this plays out. Report it to the power company, watch the number of neighborhoods expand on the power outage map, roll our eyes at the predicted time of power restoration because it will of course take days not the initially promised hours. After our 5-day winter power outage a few years ago, we bought a generator. It’s small but mighty enough to keep the food in fridge and freezers from going bad, as long as we swap them out every few hours, and to power up a lamp and space heaters in the living room. Bring out the lanterns, flashlights, and headlamps. Distribute extra blankets. We can thankfully light the gas stove with a match, so it can still be used for cooking and boiling water, as tea and coffee are necessities of winter life.

Power outage = time to play chess

A bit more excitement than usual on this particular evening: another explosive sound, and we watch a power line a block away catch fire. Call emergency services. Find out later how many tree limbs came down from the weight of the snow and a push from the wind; thankfully, none on our property this time. Over the next 2 days, the temperature in the house only drops to 55 degrees F, which is doable with sweaters. The power came back then, so it really was just a weekend adventure or practice round for when The Grid Really Fails. I imagine the heralding sound of the End of Modern Civilization to be the gradual puttering out of all the generators. On the plus side, they were kind of a cozy couple of days.

Snowy pines, Setting up the generator, More snow

Like most of the country, we had bitter cold to mark mid-January. It’s warmed up here to nearly 40 degrees F now, though with cold rain, gray skies, and even grayer mounds of snow lining every street.

The icy river that runs through our city. I took this photo mid-morning, but you can’t tell because of all the fog. Doesn’t matter though; it was just as gray when the fog lifted. I miss the sun.

Weather Lore

Many readers will recall that I love me some good weather lore. Some of the most fun are the sayings that try to guess future weather patterns (and therefore “cipher” that year’s agricultural prospects) based on the present weather of a particular feast day. Think Groundhog Day/ Candlemas. I found a new-to-me weather proverb for today, January 25, the Feast of the Conversion of St. Paul, which I’ve transcribed here from its original irregular spelling:

If the day of Saint Paul be clear,

Then shall betide a happy year:

If it does chance to snow or rain,

Then shall be dear all kind of grain,

But if the wind then be aloft,

Wars shall vex this realm full oft:

And if the clouds make dark the Sky,

Both ox and fowl this year shall die.

—Erra Pater (pseudonym), 16th century almanac writer

Sorry, that prognostication is awfully depressing. Apparently, farmers in Norway gave themselves some leeway in its interpretation: they counted St. Paul’s Day as sunny if they could harness and unharness a horse 3 times while the sun shone, even if the day was otherwise cloudy.¹ I’m afraid the weather here today portends a sad growing season ahead, with the only missing harbinger being wind aloft. Well Groundhog, I guess it’s up to you now; don’t let us down!

Here’s a cheerier quote for you. One of my all-time favorites.

Photos

On Sunday, January 7, we did the traditional Epiphany house blessing over all the outside doors, then over the beehive entrance and on the garden gate for good measure.

Epiphany blessing written with chalk on the garden gate. Sprinkled holy water over the ground at the garden entrance. Before the snowstorm & bitter cold.

For those of you in the Northern Hemisphere, what winter weather have you had? Any power outages, and if so how did you make do? Any good board games to recommend? For readers in the Southern Hemisphere, please share stories about the sun! I’ll see you all soon at the other side of the Groundhog’s shadow.

—Erin, in Michigan

1. The Oxford Companion to the Year, Blackburn & Holford-Strevens (2003).