I'm cheating a little bit today - rather than creating a blog entry from the word-of-the-day I found a word that fits what I want to write about. Not total cheating, though; the word I'm using was on the page I randomly opened to....but I knew what I wanted to write about before consulting the dictionary. Aaannnnndd today's word isn't unfamiliar to me, so I'm not creating any new vocabulary for myself. In a nutshell - who cares? Today's word is incongruous, an adjective which means not in harmony or keeping with the surroundings or other aspects of something.
Went for a walk this evening as a light, sprinkling rain fell. A perfect spring rain. Never mind the predictions of 13 feet of snow headed our way in the next couple of days - tonight's walk felt like, for the first time this season, a springtime walk. The air was mild, the robins were singing, and the rain wasn't icy or freezing on contact. Spring has always been my least favorite season, but the feel of spring in the air tonight was very soothing for some reason.
The highlight of my jaunt around the neighborhood was sighting a great blue heron. Looking completely incongruous against the white ground and solidly frozen lakes, the regal fellow was wading along the edge of the one open pond in the area. While watching him, and afterwards as I continued my walk, I couldn't imagine how he would possibly survive the coming days, possibly weeks, of non-spring conditions we still have around here. Herons are shore birds, waders, and right now 99% of the shores in the entire state are solidly frozen.
An extended spring is tough on wild creatures, especially the birds which return from their migratory hiatus and find a vast, frozen wasteland they wanted nothing to do with last fall. The robins sound so cheerful every morning, but I have to believe their songs, if translated to English, are dripping with obscenities and sarcasm as they awaken to day after day of snow-blanketed Earth. I used the word "regal" for that heron I saw - how funny would it be to hear him muttering curses towards Mother Nature? What won't be funny are the frozen carcasses of these birds that will litter our yards and roadways if we don't get a break in this cold, snowy pattern soon.
I wondered about that heron, what chance he had for survival when the only open water he could find is void of fish and frogs. I wasn't sure what else he might eat. I knew he (or she, I suppose....sorry ladies) is a meat eater but wondered if he would turn to eating seeds in desperation....become a vegaheron. So I did some research - turns out herons will eat rodents and, ahem, other birds. So, Mr. Robin Redbreast, as you go bob-bob-bobbin' along tomorrow you might want to keep an eye peeled for a viciously hungry blue heron! Which now makes me a little more concerned for the robins - if the cold and snow doesn't kill 'em, the returning blue herons will.
It sure is nice to be human sometimes. The other humans will get angry, or complain, or annoy, or find some other way to become a nuisance - but at least they, more often than not, don't attempt to eat me.
All these thoughts from a simple walk in the springtime rain.......
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