Putting winter to rest

The small pond at the end of our street has a fresh skim of ice on what had been open water for a few days. The ducks are taking it in stride (to the extent that ducks have a stride), walking on the ice when they need to, swimming in the cold water at other times. By tomorrow, I expect that the pond will be covered over in slush.

This hasn't been a hard winter. The temperature was rarely below zero. (We were below normal in the number of heating degree days.) We had more snow than in years past, but there were no big storms. The sheltered parts of the woods still have plenty of snow and the ice is nearly a couple of feet thick on some of larger lakes and ponds. No, the winter wasn't severe, just persistent. March is a hard month because we're ready for spring and, most years, spring doesn't come. We're still a month and a half to two months away from nights without freezing temperatures.

The sun is high and bright, but the wind is cold. Marley and I discovered this as we walked to the library in the center of town (a bit more than two miles each way). The snowbanks are gone and the dirt along the sidewalks have a lot of interesting smells (so Marley tells me). We enjoyed the feeling of almost being in spring as we looked at our town. We enjoyed the feeling because, tomorrow, the last day of winter, we'll take a step backward: