Will I ever get tired of looking at and taking pictures of animal tracks in the snow? All signs point to a resounding NO. Will I ever get better at identifying them beyond "uh...some kind of bird?" That's a resounding maybe?

I find this bit of sculpture dedicated to this trail's namesake very pleasing.

Gotta keep hoping, gotta back it up by working for a better world... Loved this bit of graffiti we found on the trail.

I spent the first part of the afternoon yelling at our governor (through a screen! he couldn't hear me or anything!) while he gave his state of the state address. (He has been...not as bad as he could have been, and while I'm not entirely happy with his approach to the pandemic, he has at least taken some action, rather than the irresponsible entirely hands-off approaches  we have seen in other states .)

So this afternoon, it was off for a walk to remind myself of the (Very deep and very big) "love" part of the love/hate relationship I have with my home state. It's pretty damn gorgeous here, and I love how close I am to really great hiking trails.

My country is in turmoil, and it's a pretty frightening time, but walking along the river to look at ducks is always a good thing.

Our usual stomping grounds had roads that were a combination of icy/slushy/snowy/wet that I was definitely not loving, so we found a new (to us) trailhead instead. Didn't actually do much of a hike, because the trail itself was a combination of muddy in places, or a thin layer of snow over ice and the wind was a blowing. But we sure did get some lovely views!

Also it appears some "troublemakers" (probably bored teenagers) attempted to spray paint a pentagram on this section of abandoned wall and...ended up at something that looks more like a sunflower instead. Bless.

     It seems that every year for the past several years, we have hope that the upcoming year will be kinder to us than the previous one. I fiercely hold on to that hope, because I am either a die-hard optimist, or really, really stubborn. Or maybe one thing requires the other.
     We are still being as careful as we can with pandemic numbers still surging, but with vaccine distribution already begun, everything still feels scary and weird and exhausting, but with the very beginnings of light visible at the end of the tunnel. (Insert jokes about hoping it's not a train here.)
     I will know more about if I will feel comfortable having a booth at Farmer's Market later in the year, and I had pretty much already made the decision to wait for any fringe festival travels until 2022. The yearly burlesque show I do has also been postponed until March of 2022, which is a bummer, but absolutely the right decision to keep our theatre community and audiences safe. And on a personal level, it is a relief to know what is going to happen, instead of wondering if and when I need to be ready to strap the sparkles on, and figure out how to do everything safely.
     For the moment, I have very tentative plans and thoughts on what I am going to be doing with this year. There are some things that I have been wanting to do that I haven't seemed to have time for that may be my focus this year. Re-jiggering some performance props and set pieces, and organizing my archives (Instead of cramming a bunch of stuff on a shelf) and re-doing banners and logos for my business, stuff that often gets pushed to the bottom of the priority list, but would be good to have done and free up some space and brain power for more creative work. One positive of this past year is that I have started to embrace working with the way my brain actually works, instead of cramming myself into what I think a "grown-up" work schedule should look like. (And then completely burning myself out.)
     More than anything, I am thinking about ways that I can put more kindness and hope and beauty and fun into the world, because...there are a lot of things I don't have much power to change, so maybe the best I can do is focus on those things where I can make a difference.