Filling the Feeders

I am filling the bird feeders; snow is coming.

And as I pour seed into each feeder, I am wondering, do the birds know that the weather is changing and there is snow coming?

We know because we are inundated with weather apps, news and all the chatter. Will schools be closed? Will there be ice?

People are rushing to stock up on what we perceive as the essentials, making sure to have sufficient eggs, milk and bread on hand to last several days of being snowed in.

There is an energy in the air; an energy of anticipation, of excitement. Everyone feels on heightened alert.

But what to the birds and other animals sense? Is that energy of anticipation something they feel too? What signs is the Earth giving of the coming storm?

What might we have known in the long ago times that we no longer know how to access or recognize? What might we have forgotten of the old ways we once knew?

And if there are signs, and I imagine that there are, then how can we learn to re-learn and to re-member what the earth can teach us?

I know that some nights, before a snow, that the air smells like snow. And often there are visible rings around the moon when there is snow coming. But what else is there? What other signs might I have missed? Are there signs several days out that would give the animals time to prepare? Do they even do that? It seems likely to me, but I don’t know.

What I do know is that I am going to spend more time paying more attention to what I see, sense, and notice in the next few days before the expected snow arrives. Maybe I will find a wisdom that has been there all along that I just have missed.

And, because I love the snow I am very excited about it coming. I look forward to watching it come down and the silence that comes with that. The stillness and the beauty.

I cant wait.