The year is but a succession of days,
and I see that I could assign some office to each day
which, summed up, would be the history of the year.
Henry Thoreau, August 24, 1852
Would you be well
see that you are attuned to
each mood of nature.
Mist makes near trees more
noticeable, revealing
but one at a time.
December 2019
The woods were this morning covered with thin bars of vapor. December 16, 1837
The elms covered with hoar frost, seen in the east against the morning light, are very beautiful. December 16, 1853
Begins to snow about 8 A. M., and in fifteen minutes the ground is white, but it soon stops. December 16, 1857
Plowed grounds show white first. December 16, 1857
Begins to snow and
in minutes the ground is white.
Plowed grounds show white first.
The snow everywhere is covered with snow-fleas like pepper. December 16, 1850
They look like some powder which the hunter has spilled in the path. December 16, 1850
When you hold a mass in your hand, they skip and are gone before you know it. December 16, 1850
Steady, gentle, warm rain all the forenoon, and mist and mizzling in the afternoon, when I go round by Abel Hosmer’s and back by the railroad. December 16, 1855
The mist makes the near trees dark and noticeable, like pictures, and makes the houses more interesting, revealing but one at a time. December 16, 1855
It is very pleasing to distinguish the dim outline of the woods, more or less distant, through the mist, sometimes the merest film and suspicion of a wood. December 16, 1855
Walden is open still. December 16, 1850
Observe the reflection of the snow on Pine Hill from Walden, extending far beyond the true limits of a reflection, quite across the pond; also, less obviously, of pines. December 16, 1852
When you hold a mass in your hand, they skip and are gone before you know it. December 16, 1850
Steady, gentle, warm rain all the forenoon, and mist and mizzling in the afternoon, when I go round by Abel Hosmer’s and back by the railroad. December 16, 1855
The mist makes the near trees dark and noticeable, like pictures, and makes the houses more interesting, revealing but one at a time. December 16, 1855
It is very pleasing to distinguish the dim outline of the woods, more or less distant, through the mist, sometimes the merest film and suspicion of a wood. December 16, 1855
Walden is open still. December 16, 1850
Observe the reflection of the snow on Pine Hill from Walden, extending far beyond the true limits of a reflection, quite across the pond; also, less obviously, of pines. December 16, 1852
In the reflection the snow runs into the sky, overcast with thick scud. December 16, 1852
As we go over the bridge, admire the reflection of the trees and houses from the smooth open water over the channel, where the ice has been dissolved by the rain. December 16, 1855
The river is probably open again. December 16, 1850
The river is probably open again. December 16, 1850
On those unfrequented islands, too, I noticed the red osier or willow, that common hard-berried plant with small red buds, apparently two kinds of swamp-pink buds, some yellow, some reddish, a brittle, rough yellowish bush with handsome pinkish shoots; in one place in the meadow the greatest quantity of wild rose hips of various forms that I ever saw, now slightly withered; they were as thick as winterberries. December 15, 1850
The old apple trees are very important to this landscape, they have so much body and are so dark. December 16, 1855
See two red squirrels on the fence, one on each side of [Hosmer’s], particularly red along their backs and top of head and tail. December 16, 1855
One sits twirling apparently a dried apple in his paws, with his tail curled close over his back as if to keep it warm, fitting its curve. December 16, 1855
They are remarkably tame. December 16, 1855
How much smothered sunlight in their wholesome brown red this misty day! December 16, 1855
It is clear New England, Nov-anglia, like the red subsoil. December 16, 1855
I am struck with the difference between my feet and my hands. December 16, 1850
Would you be well, see that you are attuned to each mood of nature. December 16, 1853
These days, when the earth is still bare and the weather is so warm as to create much vapor by day, are the best for these frost-works.
*****
A Book of Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, First Ice.
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, Reflections
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, the Snow-flea
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, The Red Squirrel
Walden ("Nature is as well adapted to our weakness as to our strength.")
*****
December 16, 2022
February 6, 1852 (A mistiness makes the woods look denser, darker and more primitive.)
February 12, 1855 (“All trees covered this morning with a hoar frost, very handsome looking toward the sun, —the ghosts of trees.”)
March 12, 1857 ("Observed the track of a squirrel in the snow under one of the apple trees on the southeast side of the Hill, and, looking up, saw a red squirrel with a nut or piece of frozen apple in his mouth, within six feet, sitting in a constrained position partly crosswise on a limb over my head, perfectly still, and looking not at me, but off into the air, evidently expecting to escape my attention by this trick.")
April 22, 1852 ("The mist to-day makes those near distances which Gilpin tells of.")
April 24, 1859 ("The moods and thoughts of man are revolving just as steadily and incessantly as nature’s.”)
May 9, 1852 ("Our moods vary from week to week, with the winds and the temperature and the revolution of the seasons.")
June 22, 1851 (“My pulse must beat with Nature”)
December 17, 1859 ("Two or three acres of Walden, off the bar, not yet frozen.")
December 18, 1859 ("I see three shrikes in different places to-day, — two on the top of apple trees, sitting still in the storm, on the lookout")December 18, 1859 ("Mist makes novel prospects for us . . .The oak woods a quarter of a mile off appear more uniformly red than ever . . . and the whole mass makes one impression")December 24, 1851("Saw also some pine grosbeaks, magnificent winter birds, among the weeds and on the apple trees.")
December 24, 1853 ("Walden almost entirely open again.")
December 24, 1856 ("Am surprised to find Walden still open in the middle.")
December 24, 1858 ("Two places in middle of Walden not frozen over yet, though it was quite cold last night!")
April 22, 1852 ("The mist to-day makes those near distances which Gilpin tells of.")
April 24, 1859 ("The moods and thoughts of man are revolving just as steadily and incessantly as nature’s.”)
May 9, 1852 ("Our moods vary from week to week, with the winds and the temperature and the revolution of the seasons.")
June 22, 1851 (“My pulse must beat with Nature”)
July 14, 1854 ("Health is a sound relation to nature.”)
August 4, 1854 ("Rain and mist contract our horizon and we notice near and small objects”)
August 23, 1853 ("For all Nature is doing her best each moment to make us well. She exists for no other end. Do not resist her. "Nature" is but another name for health, and the seasons are but different states of health.”)
September 20, 1857 ("The outlines of trees are more conspicuous and interesting such a day as this, being seen distinctly against the near misty background, – distinct and dark.")
September 24, 1859 ("I would know when in the year to expect certain thoughts and moods”)
October 19, 1854 (“The country above Littleton (plowed ground) more or less sugared with snow,”)
October 26, 1857 ("The seasons and all their changes are in me. ... My moods are thus periodical, not two days in my year alike.”)
November 7, 1855 ("The view is contracted by the misty rain . . . I am compelled to look at near objects.")November 7, 1855 ("I find it good to be out this still, dark, mizzling afternoon . . .The world and my life are simplified.")
November 8, 1853 ("The snow begins to whiten the plowed ground now.")
November 8, 1853 ("The snow begins to whiten the plowed ground now.")
November 18, 1857 (“Sympathy with nature is an evidence of perfect health. You cannot perceive beauty but with a serene mind”)
November 23, 1852 (“You must go forth very early to see a hoar frost, which is rare here”)
November 24, 1858 (“Plowed ground is quite white”)
November 24, 1860 (“The plowed fields were for a short time whitened”)
November 25, 1859 ("I notice the snow-fleas skipping on the surface the shore. . . . These are rather a cool-weather phenomenon.”)November 29, 1850 ("As you advance, the trees gradually come out of the mist and take form before your eyes.”)
November 29, 1850("The trees and shrubs look larger than usual when seen through the mist.")
November 29, 1856 ("They say the ground was whitened for a short time some weeks ago.")December 1, 1857 ("Walking in Ebby Hubbard's woods, I hear a red squirrel barking at me amid the pine and oak tops, and now I see him coursing from tree to tree. How securely he travels there, fifty feet from the ground . . . His travelling a succession of leaps in the air at that height without wings! And yet he gets along about as rapidly as on the ground.") December 5, 1853 ("See and hear a downy woodpecker on an apple tree.")
December 5, 1853 ("The partridge budding on the apple tree bursts away from the path-side.")
December 5, 1853 ("The partridge budding on the apple tree bursts away from the path-side.")
December 5, 1856 ("I have never got over my surprise that I should have been born into the most estimable place in all the world, and in the very nick of time, too")
December 5, 1856 ("I love the winter, with its imprisonment and its cold")
December 5, 1856 ("I love the winter, with its imprisonment and its cold")
December 5, 1857 ("At noon a few flakes fall.")
December 7, 1852 ("Saw a pile of snow-fleas in a rut in the wood-path, six or seven inches long and three quarters of an inch high, to the eye exactly like powder, as if a sportsman had spilled it from his flask.")
December 8, 1853 (“I saw from the peak the entire reflection of large white pines very distinctly against a clear white sky, though the actual tree was completely lost in night against the dark distant hillside.”)
December 9, 1856 ("I perceive that more or other things are seen in the reflection than in the substance.”)
December 9, 1855 ("At 8.30 a fine snow begins to fall, increasing very gradually, perfectly straight down, till in fifteen minutes the ground is white . . . But in a few minutes it turns to rain, and so the wintry landscape is postponed for the present.”)
December 9, 1855 ("At 8.30 a fine snow begins to fall, increasing very gradually, perfectly straight down, till in fifteen minutes the ground is white . . . But in a few minutes it turns to rain, and so the wintry landscape is postponed for the present.”)
December 10, 1854 ("Snow-fleas in paths; first I have seen.”)
December 11, 1855 (" I am struck by the perfect confidence and success of nature.")
December 13, 1852 ("River and ponds all open. Goose Pond skimmed over")
December 13, 1856 ("The river is generally open again.")
December 14, 1854 ("The river is open almost its whole length. It is a beautifully smooth mirror within an icy frame . . . and often is distinguished from the surrounding ice only by its reflections. I have rarely seen any reflections —of weeds, willows, and elms, and the houses of the village —so distinct, the stems so black and distinct;")
December 13, 1852 ("River and ponds all open. Goose Pond skimmed over")
December 13, 1856 ("The river is generally open again.")
December 14, 1854 ("The river is open almost its whole length. It is a beautifully smooth mirror within an icy frame . . . and often is distinguished from the surrounding ice only by its reflections. I have rarely seen any reflections —of weeds, willows, and elms, and the houses of the village —so distinct, the stems so black and distinct;")
December 15, 1855 ("The snow turns to rain, and this afternoon I walk in it down the railroad and through the woods. ")
December 15, 1856 ("The smooth serenity and the reflections of the pond, still alone free from ice.”)
In the reflection
snow on Pine Hill runs into
the overcast sky.
Reflection of trees
in smooth open water where
rain dissolved the ice.
December 17, 1859 ("Two or three acres of Walden, off the bar, not yet frozen.")
December 18, 1858 ("The pond is merely frozen a little about the edges.")
December 18, 1859 ("Apples are thawed now and are very good.")December 18, 1859 ("I see three shrikes in different places to-day, — two on the top of apple trees, sitting still in the storm, on the lookout")
December 20, 1854 (" It has been a glorious winter day, its elements so simple, —the sharp clear air, the white snow everywhere covering the earth, and the polished ice.")
December 21, 1856 ("The pond [Walden] is open again in the middle, owing to the rain of yesterday")
December 21, 1856 ("The pond [Walden] is open again in the middle, owing to the rain of yesterday")
December 23, 1851("The partridges have come forth to bud on the apple trees.")
December 24, 1853 ("Walden almost entirely open again.")
December 24, 1856 ("Am surprised to find Walden still open in the middle.")
December 24, 1858 ("Two places in middle of Walden not frozen over yet, though it was quite cold last night!")
December 26, 1850 (“Walden not yet more than half frozen over.”)
December 26, 1853 ("Walden still open.. . . the only pond hereabouts that is open.")
December 26, 1853 ("Walden still open.. . . the only pond hereabouts that is open.")
December 26, 1853 ("This forenoon it snows pretty hard for some hours, the first snow of any consequence thus far. It is about three inches deep")
December 26, 1857 ("Snows all day, — first snow of any consequence, three or four inches in all.”)
December 27, 1852 ("Not a particle of ice in Walden to-day. . . .. Ground bare. River open.")
December 27, 1856 ("Walden is still open in one place of considerable extent.")
December 27, 1851 ("The sky is always ready to answer to our moods.")
December 27, 1852 ("Not a particle of ice in Walden to-day. . . .. Ground bare. River open.")
December 27, 1856 ("Walden is still open in one place of considerable extent.")
December 27, 1851 ("The sky is always ready to answer to our moods.")
December 29, 1855 ("Am surprised to find eight or ten acres of Walden still open")
January 3, 1853 (“Walden not yet frozen.”)
January 6, 1858 ("The North River is not frozen over.")
January 7, 1855 (“The channel of the river is quite open in many places, and I hear the pleasant sound of running water. A certain dormant life awakes in me, and I begin to love nature again.")
January 13, 1859 ("A very remarkable sort of hoar frost, the crystallized fog, which is still increasing, an inch deep on many trees, and gets to be much more,. . . It is quite rare here, at least on this scale. ")
January 18, 1860, . ("They are very different seasons in the winter when the ice of the river and meadows and ponds is bare, — blue or green, a vast glittering crystal, — and when it is all covered with snow or slosh; and our moods correspond")
January 22, 1860 ("This must be as peculiarly a winter animal as any. It may truly be said to live in snow.")
January 23, 1858 (“To insure health, a man’s relation to Nature must come very near to a personal one”).
January 23, 1858 (“It is in vain to write on the seasons unless you have the seasons in you.”)
January 3, 1853 (“Walden not yet frozen.”)
January 6, 1858 ("The North River is not frozen over.")
January 7, 1855 (“The channel of the river is quite open in many places, and I hear the pleasant sound of running water. A certain dormant life awakes in me, and I begin to love nature again.")
January 13, 1859 ("A very remarkable sort of hoar frost, the crystallized fog, which is still increasing, an inch deep on many trees, and gets to be much more,. . . It is quite rare here, at least on this scale. ")
January 18, 1860, . ("They are very different seasons in the winter when the ice of the river and meadows and ponds is bare, — blue or green, a vast glittering crystal, — and when it is all covered with snow or slosh; and our moods correspond")
January 22, 1860 ("This must be as peculiarly a winter animal as any. It may truly be said to live in snow.")
January 23, 1858 (“To insure health, a man’s relation to Nature must come very near to a personal one”).
January 23, 1858 (“It is in vain to write on the seasons unless you have the seasons in you.”)
If you make the least correct
observation of nature this year,
you will have occasion to repeat it
with illustrations the next,
and the season and life itself is prolonged.
December 15 <<<<<<<< December 16 >>>>>>>> December 17
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau, December 16
A Book of the Seasons, by Henry Thoreau
"A book, each page written in its own season,
out-of-doors, in its own locality."
~edited, assembled and rewritten by zphx © 2009-2023
tinyurl.com/hdt16dec
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