3/04/08

Tuesday, 8:00 AM. 0 degrees, up from –3 at 7:30 AM. Wind SE, presently calm. Barometer down, predicting partly cloudy skies, which are blue except for some haze over the Island.
As lucky and I left the house this morning we were greeted by the characteristic three-note whistle of the male cardinal, which I take to be a territorial call, and if it is indeed such, that is yet another sign of spring.
Another hint of spring is that I am beginning to put away the winter’s accumulation of books, mainly natural history tomes, which like fallen leaves are cluttering the coffee table, the end table and various other repositories around my usual seat. The library shelves stand gap-toothed, waiting to welcome back these winter stragglers.
First to go back is a volume of Alexander Pope’s 18th Century poetry, which I had scoured to find a quote from one of his poems which has been a mantra of mine for forty and more years; “Nature, in whose variety we see, though all things differ, all agree.” That phrase is more-or-less accurately adapted from his poem “Windsor Woods.”
That line is carved into the fireplace mantle in the old library at the Boerner Botanical Gardens in Milwaukee, and has affected me more over the years than any number of college ecology courses with all their measurements and statistics. The pen it seems is not only mightier than the sword, but perhaps mightier than the slide rule as well.
No birds at the feeder as yet, but this is only my first cup of coffee.