We live in a calm area of what is now known as the Salish Sea. Technically north of the Puget Sound the waters of our bay and the area between the mainland and Vancouver Island and the smaller Islands is known as the Strait of Georgia. The cluster of islands in the Strait and the big Island provide a great deal of shelter from the North Pacific’s raging storm tides and fierce winds. As one writer put it, the Pacific is anything but pacific. South of here, where the waters of the Strait of Juan de Fuca circle around the southern end of Vancouver Island, the wind and waves can be much more fierce than they are further north. But here in Birch Bay we are lucky to avoid some of the worst of the fury of the open ocean.

It was windy here yesterday. The winds howled the night before and started to calm through the morning. We got a few raindrops, but no steady hard rain during the day. I was able to work outdoors during much of the day without having to endure any hardships. My winter parka, often a daily companion during South Dakota winters remained in the closet. An insulated sweatshirt was sufficient and that was shed when I had tasks that took me inside the unheated shop.

There was, however, some pretty wild weather not far from where we live. Over on the big island, wind gusts of up to 60 mph combined with surging waves led to road closures, ferry cancellations, and power outages. Environment Canada issued a special weather statement for higher than usual ocean levels for shorelines along the Strait of Juan de Fuca, including the capitol city of Victoria. More than 85,000 customers were without electricity on the island at one point yesterday.

South of us, in Sedro-Woolley, near where our son works in Mount Vernon, there is an ongoing power outage affecting around a hundred homes. Trees fell onto power lines causing a row of power poles to collapse. The power went out late Monday night and is not expected to be restored until tomorrow. One of the employees at the library where our son is the director called in and said that they were unable to come to work as “just keeping my house warm is a full-time job.”

When I first ventured out of the house in the morning, I went down to the bay to have a look. The tide was in and the water was high. The water in Terrill Creek, which empties into the bay just a ways up the beach was almost as high as it was a year ago when a king tide flooded homes. But the waves on the bay were very small and the roads were all dry. We walked down to the bay in the afternoon when the waters had receded and though the waves were higher as the cold front passed there was no damage in evidence. Up on the hill at our home we were snug, safe, and secure.

The forecast called for snow, but what they call snow around here isn’t much compared to other places where we have lived. Our lawn was white Monday morning, but the snow wasn’t sticking to the roads and by mid-afternoon what snow had fallen was gone, washed away by rain.

In the Cascade Mountains to the east and farther north on the other side of the border, things were different. Heavy snow has been falling for a couple of days. The snow fell onto previous snowfalls that had become unstable due to rain and warmer than usual temperatures making unstable conditions with lots of avalanche danger. the Coquihala Highway and Highway 3 in interior British Columbia were closed at time with blizzard conditions and avalanche warnings.

And all of the weather phenomena in our region is nothing compared to the massive storms battering the eastern part of the continent. So far, when it comes to winter weather, we don’t have much to complain about.

The forecast calls for colder temperatures toward the end of the week. Our 40 degree weather will give way to lows in the teens. I might even get out my winter parka and maybe my long johns, but I won’t have need of my insulated coveralls.

Of course, I am retired. I don’t have work that requires me to be outside. I can stay at home whenever I want to. But I love to putter around the farm. The project this week has been setting a few new posts and installing a couple of gates. I’ve also got projects going in the shop including a kayak that is waiting for warmer weather so I can work epoxy and two new sets of bee boxes preparing for a couple of additional colonies in our apiary next spring. I have also been spending a couple of hours a week working with our grandson in an improvised shop class to supplement his middle school education. He’s build himself a nice toolbox and is becoming handy at a few other woodworking tasks.

Despite our sheltered location, the birds in our backyard seem to be pretty hungry. In the fall I was filling the bird feeders about once a week. Now it is an every-other day chore. I’ve started buying birdseed in 25 pound bags at the feed store finding the hardware store prices a bit high for our voracious birds. I’m not complaining. The birds provide way more entertainment than lots of things that cost a lot more. We keep our bird books on the kitchen counter these days as we have occasional visits from birds we don’t recognize. The suet has attracted woodpeckers and a flicker, while the seed feeders attract mostly common birds.

I seem to be sliding into a fairly comfortable retirement routine. I’m much more relaxed and at home with the relaxed schedule than I was a couple of years ago. I guess, like other phases of life, it takes time to adjust to the change. But life is good, and between the weather and the birds, I don’t have any problem coming up with things to talk about.