swinger of birches

We had a little snow here late last week that extended my hiatus away from the computer. This is a view of my backyard from the deck. The bowed trees are a clump of four river birch that are approximately 30 feet tall (well, when they were standing). I planted the trees there on purpose, so I could look at them from my office window in my house.

Anyway, there are still many people in the Western New York area still without electricity, heat, etc. and we are very fortunate.

Much of the snow is melting now and my birches are struggling to stand again. I think they will.

I don't mind that this happened; it reminds me of important lessons that I like to think of as I go about my daily work. Thank you, Robert Frost:

So was I once myself a swinger of birches.
And so I dream of going back to be.
It's when I'm weary of considerations,
And life is too much like a pathless wood
Where your face burns and tickles with the cobwebs
Broken across it, and one eye is weeping
From a twig's having lashed across it open.
I'd like to get away from earth awhile
And then come back to it and begin over.
May no fate wilfully misunderstand me
And half grant what I wish and snatch me away
Not to return. Earth's the right place for love:
I don't know where it's likely to go better.
I'd like to go by climbing a birch tree,
And climb black branches up a snow-white trunk
Toward heaven, till the tree could bear no more,
But dipped its top and set me down again.
That would be good both going and coming back.
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches.

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