Eight degrees above zero this morning, and you'd think that news would cheer me up, except that we got another load of snow last night, the driveway is impassable yet again, the town plow truck has shoved two tons of hard-packed ice in front of my mailbox, and Ruckus, offended by the weather, is rocketing through the house trying to break stuff. Also, I have a headache.

I am trying hard to remember the beauties. Here's one: My sixteen-year-old, who spent the weekend with his wilderness-trip friends at a remote cabin in Washington County, said that the five of them snowshoed three miles over a pristine frozen lake at midnight under a full moon. Nothing will ever be as glorious, he told me.