Dawn of the Decade

The media is so quick to make big declarations about events, like Party of the Year, or Storm of the Century.

I woke up Tuesday morning to all the usual chores: feed the dogs, find the newspaper in one of the many locations our PD carrier throws it to avoid the porch; get the kids off to school…

It wasn’t until 7:25, when I pulled out of the driveway for the trip to middle school that I realized this must be the Dawn of the Decade.

The sky was rose, the air was bracingly clear. Every surface was covered with an eighth-inch of ice from the previous night’s frozen rain. The homely chain-link fence looked like Pop Art; the trees like sculpture.

Neighbors down the block were planning their annual and well-timed exodus to Florida, and I couldn’t help thinking that – while warm weather would be nice – it’s rare mornings like this that make the long, gray winter something to not only tolerate but embrace.

It was another half-hour before I stopped to snap these photos with the camera on my smart phone. The color of the sky had already changed to blue, and the magical quality of the morning had largely dissipated into a beautiful but ordinary day.