Wind storms and leaves

Nothing Gold Can Stay

Robert Frost

"Nature's first green is gold,

Her hardest hue to hold,

Her early leaf's a flower;

But only so an hour.

Then leaf subsides to leaf.

So Eden sank to grief,

So dawn goes down to day.

Nothing gold can stay."

Robert Frost didn't mince his words. And when winter hits in the Northwest, I always think about how puny humans are, and that Nature will have the last word. If you watch the Weather Channel, you'll see us hit by one storm after the other as they race in from the Pacific. Just a reminder we're perched on the edge of a cold ocean, in a place that was a wilderness only 100 years ago. So trees fall across roads and come down in housing developments causing all sorts of expensive havoc. I remember when one wind "event" a year was more typical, but this November we've had several already.

If you live in a place long enough, you'll notice changes in weather patterns. This makes you feel old as a glacier.

But on the bright side, the temperatures have been relatively mild so far and the beautiful gold leaves have lasted a long time. Between storms yesterday, I got out to plant a big hydrangea in one of the flower beds I'm re-working. I took this picture of our neighbors' birch trees, which are nice to look at year round.