The thing about gray winter days

is that every now then -- actually occasionally, only now that I think about it, truly rarely -- a sunny day or a sunny afternoon or even just a sunny hour pops up, reminding me why I feel imprisoned.

This was yesterday.

Today was gray.

Gray Sky vs Blue Sky

At the University Farm today, the manager and I chatted about the abundant spinach and chard, the new method of keeping plants warm under covers in extreme cold, a possible student research project in the physics of the plants' warmth under those covers, the squirming larvae due to arrive at the beginning of the semester, and the advantages of photographing plants under gray sky. These advantages can easily be seen.

Their colors do indeed pop.

Even the old dairy building in which the culled deer are refrigerated before butchering and much of the farm's equipment are stored has a certain beauty under our typical winter sky. 

The red bittersweet, ochred wood, fading graffiti do indeed pop.

But.

In a contest of one versus the other, I'd take a strong blue sky and shadows any day.

Even today.

An Apology to the Elderly Lady Patiently Waiting to Park in the Handicap Space at The Pig

I had to snap the only beautiful thing on still another gray day.

I am so sorry, and I thank you greatly for your kind patience.

Too Much, Too Little

So orange, the zinnia burns the lens.

So misty, the water tower flattens.

Too much of one.

Too little of the other.

Surely the weeks of gray days must end.

This Time Last Year

the sun shone and flowers bloomed, but this year the sky stayed gray, all day, like unleavened and moldy bread, flatflatflat. 

So I looked back and found this and this and this.

These will have to do until the sun decides it's time to reappear.