Winter in Spudville

...will be a lot more bearable once we get the heat leaks in this antique old house plugged. We’ll always have pretty pictures, though.

It’s getting just warm enough in Monte Vista, Colorado, that we can cut the wood pellet stove off in the middle of the day to conserve fuel. “Warm enough” means “50s Fahrenheit,” which feels quite toasty compared to the low double-digit/single digit temps we’d get at night in December and January. 

Railcars at the ends of their lines as Acequia Avenue angles in to meet US 285.

We’ll still get an occasional dip into the teens at night, as we will tonight. Alas, if there is one aspect of the Deep South I grew up in that I would like to see in Colorado, but never will, is a proper spring with blooming dogwoods and azaleas. I miss the bright colors against the deep green of foliage, the perfume of wisteria. Spring in Colorado simply means house-shaking, fence-breaking windstorms.

It’s still a fair exchange for White Christmases and mild, sweet summers. I’ll simply have to get rich so I can fly back to Dixie during spring in time to see the sticky yellow pollen gum up everything. The jungle heat will send me back to my adoptive home soon enough.

Meanwhile, it’s gratifying enough seeing the valley fields emerge from their snow cover.

This photo and all following were taken on 5 Mile North Road, 22 February 2017, by Cynthia J. Aiken on her phone as we drove due east towards the Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve.

By 22 February most of the snow was gone from the fields around US 160, so it was surprising to see this just five miles north of all that. The temperatures can be quite regionally perverse here in the San Luis Valley.

If this ain’t country....

One of my wife’s favorites from this batch.

...and we’re all clear here, save for a scrum of ice on the edge.