Once Upon A Winter's Day

This year, Christmas Day dawned bright and clear. 

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society, where none intrudes,
By the deep sea, and music in its roar:
I love not man the less, but Nature more.
~George Gordon, Lord Byron, 

Childe Harold's Pilgrimage

Coffee was made, waffles were eaten, gifts were given. 
 You can't be suspicious of a tree, or accuse a bird or a squirrel of subversion or challenge the ideology of a violet.  ~Hal Borland, Sundial of the Seasons, 1964

As the day wore on, the weather was still fine, so we decided to go for a walk down by the ocean.  

The sun, with all those planets revolving around it and dependent on it, can still ripen a bunch of grapes as if it had nothing else in the universe to do.  ~Galileo Galilei

It was a bit windy and cool, but as the sun went lower into the west, the colors grew deeper and more intense, a glorious end to a special day.  

Those who dwell among the beauties and mysteries of the earth are never alone or weary of life.  ~Rachel Carson 

And I will be eternally grateful for that day, those moments, these images. 

Photos: TJBGoogins/2011/iPhone using HipstaPrint app