11:27am       50˚F, cloudy

During my first fifteen minutes of tuning in, a small gray bird with a white chest flew past me and landed in a lalin cypress tree. The wind made it feel much colder than 50˚. I heard interstate sounds and a bird in the northeast that sounded like it was saying, “tweet tweet” every one-two seconds. I researched some common backyard birds, and it did not match any of the calls listed as backyard birds. Looking at the red maple tree, I noticed a small bird nest in the top of the tree. I could see it easily since the leaves were gone. I wondered what kind of bird built the nest, how long the nest had been there, and how many of the offspring survived. There were long periods where I did not hear any birds, just interstate noise, which worked out because this was when I was writing in my journal. I did not miss much because of this. What stood out to me the most on this day was how calm, quiet, and still everything was. Yes, I did hear the interstate, some birds, and the wind blew the trees a little (not much because most leaves were completely gone off the trees aside from the lalin cypress), but this signifies winter to me. The cold, the lack of activity (not even birds at the bird feeder), the cloudiness, all these things made me feel very wintery while tuning in during the first fifteen minutes.

One of the three objects, the red maple, has changed drastically. For my last blog, the tree had turned completely red. For this blog, the leaves are almost completely gone. I counted three small remaining leaves. The period of time the tree sat with its fully red leaves before losing them was very short. It’s hard to believe this tree was so full for my first few blogs. I had to add in my journal that at that point, I was rubbing my hands together because I was cold. I thought I heard a woodpecker, and I got all excited. Turns out, it was just the zipper on my jacket moving while I rubbed my hands….The other two objects, the spider web and the root, did not seem to change. The spider web is still uninhabited, and the root perhaps looks a little dryer than the last time I saw it. This could be due to the cold, dry climate right now as we get closer to officially being in the winter season.

While taking pictures of my three objects, I noticed a cluster of 10 mushrooms, two of which had no heads, bordering where the grass meets the mulch under the red maple tree. These mushrooms were small and brown. When I researched what type the may be, they seemed to closely match brown conehead mushrooms. I thought it was so odd to see mushrooms in this time of year. Usually when I think of mushrooms and fungus, I think of them growing in moist, warmish climates. I did not realize they could survive in this cold.

The wind was blowing southeast, directly at me while I was journaling. The clouds did seem to be moving in the direction of the wind, but more generally to the south, not specifically moving southeast. In the west, there was a section of clouds that looked altocumulus to me. They were middle altitude and looked like layers. Most of the clouds directly above me were cirrostratus, high altitude, thin, and grayish blue. I found that looking directly up at the clouds hurt my eyes even though the sun was not out. I suppose the sunlight’s reflection off the clouds was still bright enough to cause this.

I chose to challenge my focus by sitting with my eyes closed. For most of the 10 minutes, I heard a group of crows in the southwest. Curious what the name of such a group was, I researched this and found a group of crows is called, to my surprise, a “murder.” Aside from the crows, the interstate noise was the only noise I heard. For my final blog spot, I wish the day was warmer, but I think it was valuable because it truly defined winter to me.

Red Maple vs. Bare Maple

Root

Spider Web

Brown Coneheads

Altocumulus Clouds

Cirrostratus CLouds