Two thousand fourteen took a long time to get to June. Cities keep life at a steady pitch of bustle and noise, punctuated DJ-style by samples of holidays and news. In the country, change is both greater and more gradual.
The year begins in darkness. I am never up, bathroom breaks aside, to see daybreak, but I am very conscious of nightbreak. In the new-born year, the small cold sun shuts down at five o’clock. The twin of darkness is silence. Grasshoppers and crickets died months ago, there are no leaves to rustle; the stream is muffled in snow and ice. Only a strong wind will stir pine boughs audibly. There are still birds about, but they waste as little energy as possible in conversation. Once I heard a saw-whet owl in winter; I thought it was machinery — distant, tiny, repetitious machinery, fit music for the cold.
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