New England is home, my place. Four seasons roughly three months apiece. I enjoy each, and the expectation of each each season's constancy is a given. ( But Laura says: "we broke the weather.") Because winter as we know it - delivering an average of 6-feet of snow -- almost never came this year. And it definitely wasn't on time.

Waiting and expecting and wondering if it would ever snow again. November was cold and snowless, and then December and January came and went, and still no white on the ground. (Christmas lights without snow look all wrong in New England.) I just about lost faith, when it finally arrived 3 months behind schedule -- on February 2nd. I was in Royalston playing up at the Open Mic stage and drove home in a wild-snow storm. (There was a danger to it, but I was delighted - and used caution, sometimes.)

The snow was like that gift that should have come two weeks before Christmas, but it put a funk on everything because it never arrived. It was lost in the back of the UPS barn, until someone finally stumbled on it and got it delivered - way late.

That storm primed the pump and the snows have come again and again. A relief yes, and for a while the world was right again. The ground was finally covered with the thick white blanket with its long blue shadows, under the the low-pitched sun. Even in the middle of a moon-less night the snow illumines. Magical winter night light, from the ground up, instead of the other way around.

But in fact everything is still shifted late, and so it's all off. (On the day of the vernal equinox I was cross-country skiing in the backwoods, while listening to spring birds singing. Strangely beautiful, but seasonally wrong. As I said, it's all off. Fortunately, it's warming and melting fast, with rains and winds blowing up, carrying the returning birds.

But when the snows were deep, my mind looked across the opposite horizon, recalling summer -- the 4-hour drive to the ocean, the tip of the Cape. That's when I put that picture of last summer up on my homepage - Herring Cove, the National Seashore - the lovely jewel that is Provincetown. A highlight of our visits to Provincetown is to have the chance to see again the lovely person, Hilary Bamford, a woman of many talents, one of which is that she is the host and DJs a terrific and popular folk show on WOMR (Outer Cape Community Radio, 92.1 FM). I think it was my fourth time on her show. We had a great time and like all great times, it moved by too fast. If you get the chance, take a peek at the photos of Hilary and the Cape and others at my site. (I love taking pictures!)
Thank you for visiting and reading. Reading is good.
"Only connect." (E.M. Forster)

-Francis

p.s. many thanks to Deb and Nadia and Debra and Thea for giving me some answers, and a helping hand (and sympathy for me with my confusion about this dang thing!) all of which got me on my feet and on the path to this myspace place.)