February possesses its own style of winter, separate from that of January. This year the month was a series of winter storms, slowly subsiding and warming by month’s end. Snow-pack on the ground is receding, melting away under the warming sun quicker than the recent storms could replace. Now is mud season. February’s winter brought amazing skies and enjoyable, for winter, weather conditions. By the end of the month spring began to feel like an actual possibility. Winter is not finished, but we are getting closer to the end.

     The last day of the month saw a snow-storm blow across the land of enchantment.

Clouds and snow, mists and fog, rode the leading edge. Hills, mesas, and prairie vanished, and then reappeared with the wind. Some of the cells contained lightning and thunder as they dropped pellet-snow on the landscape. Occasionally the sky would clear partially and the sun would shine, and then clouds returned again, horizon to horizon. After sunset the full moon of February floated in the cloudless dark.

 The dogs living here with me enjoy the winter snows and cold; they adapt well to their environment. Reduced snow-cover and warming soil really does seem to agree with them: sleeping in the sunshine, digging for mice and marauding gophers, their world is expanding. For all their excitement in snow, even the dogs seem to have acquired their own form of ‘cabin-fever’. We are all glad to be closer to the end of winter. The dance changes with time and adapts to the season. Sometimes the traditional morning biscuit dance; sometimes a dance in the warmth, and mud, of afternoon.    An eternal expression of joy, happy just to be here.

  We are under no delusion; winter is not finished in the land of enchantment; there will be more snow, but the last storms of the season. The winter of December and January is not forgotten; the evidence is everywhere. But it’s just a memory now. The spring seed catalogs are piled on the table, a reminder of the approaching season. The sun is undeniably moving north towards the equinox, to make it official.

  February seems sort of just a ‘place-holder’, getting us from one place to another, not really important once it’s behind us. Glad to see it begin, much more so to see it end, but never wishing away time.

  Unexpected winter flowers on the high desert, for you.