No Snowshovels

It’s January 6, and I still haven’t touched a snow shovel. The temperatures linger just above freezing, cold but wet, frosting only now and then.

I used to think, when I first heard about global warming so many decades ago, that a warming climate would be a welcome relief in winter.

Instead, snow has been replaced with cold mud.

The winter light here in the north remains low, dim, and brief.

The difference is that now, we don’t even have the reflective brilliance of the snow to brighten the day.

The result is that these warmer winters are even more grim than they were before.