Dreaming the World

After a blistering July, August began with deep chill. At one point Friday afternoon the temperature was 63F with a stiff breeze blowing in from the northeast. I kept putting on layers until late afternoon when the sun came out, the wind died down, and the temperature rose into the low 70’s.

This morning the temperature was in the mid-50’s but I opened the doors and windows, and Nori scampered onto the screen porch. A neighbour cat came by and Nori became territorial, chattering and yelling, tail wagging fiercely. The other cat just looked confused, tried to make friends, then wondered off.

I had a few errands to run and when I arrived back home three rabbits of various sizes are congregated in the driveway and refused to let me pass. They did not move till I opened the van door to get out and herd them away. This seems to be the year of the rabbit and, like turkeys in past years, they have become accustomed to us and are remarkably tame.

Last evening at twilight Nori began running from the screen porch to the screen door in our bedroom, and back. Eventually I had to get up and see whether I could identify the source of her excitement; I often can’t. In the meadow, mostly obscured by trees, was a lovely doe. That became a haiku:

I’ve just finished rereading Gladys Taber’s classic volume, Stillmeadow Seasons. The book was first published in 1950 and remains widely available; I gave mine up when we last moved so was pleased to discover a copy at the library.

I’m re-reading the volume as part of a larger project comparing the seasonal narratives of writers from the last century to our present climate. Taber describes New England’s season in near classic terms. She was a woman writer concerned with placing the domestic in the context of the natural world around her, and bringing some solace and peace to her readers at a time of great danger and anxiety. She had an immense readership that sometimes earned her the dismissal of reviewers from the intelligentsia.

All writing is of its own time, and Taber’s is no exception. She offers wifely advice to other women trying to navigate the post war period. She frets over what she perceives as a growing lack of generosity and compassion among Americans, even as she readies packages to send to friends, and others, who are struggling in England. She writes approvingly of the new plastic products and household gadgets, like dishwashers, that make her life easier.

At her farm in Connecticut’s hill country, spring appears in late April, the summers are warm but not oppressive, the first frost comes in late September, and by early December there is snow and cold. There is yearly variation in the season but it is within known limits and can be managed in home and garden. Nature is dependable and a source of soothing in hard times.

When I moved to the relatively balmy by Vermont standards, Burlington, in the Champlain Valley of Vermont, in the late 1970’s we could count on frost by mid to late September and the first snows in November. I can remember major snow storms on my birthday the second week of the month. By early December many days remained below freezing and most storms produced snow, or rain changing to snow.

The last years we lived in Burlington the first frost came in mid-to late October, some 4-6 weeks later than in our first years there. Consistent cold now arrives there in mid to late December and December storms are as likely to bring rain or ice snow.

Here on the southern New England coast the first frost now comes late, sometimes not till early November, and the past few years have offered little snow. The rapidly warming coastal waters have dramatically changed the yearly cycle.

We remember the world of our childhood as the baseline for normal. Let me end with a brief quote from Stillmeadow Seasons. Seventy-five years ago Taber was thinking about the state of the world at Christmas when, “The old tired earth is most beautiful and lovely.” Her description of the time fits my experience as I was seven just a few years later, in 1955.

We do live in parlous times. Nobody can deny it. With the divorce rate skyrocketing, and foreign troubles sitting like gray wolves outside the door, and politics a shambles, and unrest in every industry, and the economic situation unstable, we know that life is grave. Our country is full of underpriveledged people; we face crises not one a month but every week. I know all this. I know we are bigoted and narrow minded – and I read many letters from women who say they will not bring a child into this world because they are afraid. page 198