In some of the old New England records, you read about “green winters”: winters when it was relatively warm, and there was little snow. We’re in the middle of a green winter. Many lakes and ponds remain free of ice, and the ground isn’t even frozen. It’s nice that we haven’t had much snow, and it’s nice that our heating bill has been low. But a green winter often means more insect pests the following summer, to the dismay of gardeners and farmers. Worse yet, in the old days cold was thought to kill of diseases, so green winters were thought to bring disease; and here we are faced with the possibility of an avian flu epidemic following a green winter. I’m enough of a New Englander that I can’t just accept the gift of an easy winter; I have to search out something the disadvantages and disasters that must accompany something good; to a New Englander, there is no such thing as an unalloyed good.