It’s hard to believe that it’s been nearly a whole month since we awoke to 2015, and that first chilly day of the year had us at our traditional New Year’s place: Cold Spring, New York, a village on the Hudson (most photos here courtesy of my husband Tom, except where noted).

Although I continue to work on becoming a hardier example of our species, this wasn’t a prime day for long strolls in the out of doors. The wind whipped off the river; the temperatures were in the teens, maybe even single digits with the wind chill. But even so, we were bundled up and enjoyed a brisk 25 minutes or so on the coast, where we picked through driftwood on the beach, watched long cargo trains pull by on the opposite shore, and marveled at the abundance of spiky, otherworldly-looking water chestnut seed pods, sometimes called devil’s heads, that had washed up onto the beach. (I learned from The Incidental Steward by Akiko Busch that water chestnuts, introduced in the late 1800s as exotic ornamentals, have become quite the invasive species, choking our rivers and spreading at alarming rates).

Water Chestnut Seed Pod
From peppergrasss on Flickr

After a warm and happy lunch at Le Bouchon we took a meandering drive along the river, happening upon a herd of deer grazing in an overgrown meadow.

The day was refreshing and lively but indubitably COLD. We didn’t leave the car when we capped the day with our traditional drive through Hubbard Park on the way home, to see the Christmas lights display.

I’m not sure whether two sightings since that cold first day of 2015–and before the recent mega snowfall–should be taken as signs of the havoc that climate change is predicted to bring, but, regardless, they have made me more hopeful about spring coming. In the Wal-Mart parking lot, Tom and I were treated to the spectacle of two sparrows mating alongside the curb—cute, fascinating, and shocking all at the same time. I looked up house sparrows (although I can’t swear this was the variety we saw—didn’t want to create any sparrow scandals by snapping an incriminating photo), and sure enough, they sometimes begin mating as early as January. And then, on a drive along beautiful River Road from Essex to Deep River, I saw an osprey on an aerie. According to the CT DEEP page, they aren’t supposed to return from Southern hunting grounds until March. Then again, you get some early birds in every crowd. I may have to nudge the Essex OspreyCam operators so they can activate the live feed again.

It’s been good for me to learn this winter that life does go on outside even when my instinct tells me to stay where it’s warm and dig in deeper beneath the blankets. Did you know that when birds go South, it’s more about finding food than getting away from the cold? I want to keep them close–I trudged through nearly 2 feet of snow yesterday to get to the bird feeder and was rewarded by an audience (from afar) with several female cardinals. I wonder if they would have liked these berries that managed to display themselves so artfully in Cold Spring:

(PS: For those who perked up at “free books” in the title, I am giving away some copies, while they last, of Get Satisfied: How Twenty People Like You Found the Satisfaction of Enough, in which I have a piece published; as well as Harriet’s Voice: A Writing Mother’s Journey. I’m afraid I can’t pay postage but happy to get copies to locals or work out some kind of prepaid mailing arrangement for those afar).