Yes, there is a little red splotch running through the text here. I added it some time ago to the stock background I got from one of those “free web graphics” sites. I use Paint Shop Pro to manipulate graphics, and though I’m no artist, neither with pixels nor with pencils, I was able to drop in a few squares of red to resemble a cardinal.

At left you see a picture of one of the actual cardinals that lives in the tangle of forsythia at the edge of our property. I wrote in this space last May about how I have come to love the birds that visit our feeders. Although it isn’t apparent from this photo (which was taken last year with our old camera when we were just getting started with capturing images for these pages), this cardinal is a brilliant ruby color, and he makes a commanding presence, especially against snow.

The snow is gone from the vista. Tonight I put away some of the very last of the
Christmas decorations -- things I’d kept out because I like them, and because they were more winter items, with just a holly leaf or two to suggest the holiday. Among my favorites are a carved snowman with a cardinal perched on his head, a lantern for a votive candle that is shaped like a birdhouse with a cardinal on the side, and dried branches painted silver which I stuck in a blue pitcher and adorned with a tree ornament of a cardinal with its wings spread.

The time seemed right to start moving into spring, even though this area has experienced some of its worst snowstorms in recent years after the middle of March. The air is warm, the daffodils shoots have poked through the mulch, and spring feels like more than just a promise. But the trees are still bare, so I thought the change to the background with the cardinal might prove a good transition.

This is a very short piece. I was trying to write one for each day in February for which I had a “year ago” link, plus a few more. I have five dates to cover, and four topics that I have pieces begun for. Over the next few days I’ll be inserting them. If you’re on my notify list, you’ll know when they go up. If not, and you’d like to read them, there’ll be a note at the bottom in the links list. (And that’s about as “meta” -- writing about the writing of this on-line journal -- that I like to get!)

A stepdaughter who lived here briefly once called it "hopelessly middle class." I call it comfortable.