At the
risk of being pilloried by kith and kin who've had enough of winter, I freely admit
that I love it. While many have had
their fill of sub-zero temperatures, heavy snow fall and shoveling, I just can’t
get enough of these beautiful winter days.
I like winter so much that I grabbed an opportunity to trade 20 degree
temperatures and 6 inches of snow in New Jersey for minus 15 degree
temperatures and 2 ½ feet of snow in the Catskills. It sure is beautiful up here – the proverbial
Winter Wonderland. So it shouldn't surprise you that the first thing on my agenda was a good walk.
Being
firmly nestled in middle age, I don’t need help waking up early any more – I just
do. But that suits me fine, especially
when I want to slip in a good walk before the day’s chores take hold of my
agenda. So up I rose at 6:00 am and
quickly got dressed for snow shoeing in the woods. I knew it would be very cold outside, but I
also knew that I’d warm up quickly dragging my 49-year old carcass through 2 ½ feet
of undriven snow. My choice of winter
apparel, therefore, had to be breathable but still warm enough to keep me alive
in the likely event that I would get tangled in my snow shoes, do a face plant
in the snow, and struggle for a while to get up. Let’s just say that I looked like Nanook of
the North gone Ninja.
All bundled
up, I set out on the trail into the woods.
As expected, it was a tough slog at first, so after a few hundred yards,
I stopped to catch my breath. When I
stopped to breathe, I finally started to notice. I noticed that it was a beautiful day. Though the sun had not yet made its way over
the bluestone mountains, the deep blue sky reflected its cheerful hue on the
pure white snow that blanketed the earth.
The grey, black and brown bark of the bare maple, birch and oak trees
stood in sharp contrast to the breathtaking color above, and the absence of
color below. As I continued on, I
noticed that each step was announced by the crunch of the inch-deep layer of
frozen snow that capped the ample powder below.
Loud and plodding, the rhythmic cadence of my trek drowned out the sounds
of Mother Nature awakening. Or so I
thought.
The next time I stopped to catch my
breath, I noticed something pretty powerful – silence. No birds, no wind rustling through the trees,
just silence. I didn't believe what I didn't hear at first. The Catskills is
filled with countless birds, animals and babbling brooks, and the wind always
seems to be running down the mountains and racing through the valleys. But there’s something special about the early
morn of a crisp, clear winter’s day. The
birds and animals stay tucked away in the nooks and crannies of the trees and
rocks; the babbling brooks are hushed by the massive ice formations that slowly
develop during a long, cold winter; and the wind seems to take a needed rest, gathering
its strength for the next storm. Add to
that the muffling effect of deep, heavy snow and you get silence – profound,
wonderful silence.
Turning back toward home, I found
myself head-down, intently planning each step out of fear that my weary legs might
betray me at any moment. At first, the plain,
white snow seemed a much less compelling canvas to gaze upon the wonders of
nature until I noticed the silver-grey hull of a spent milkweed pod rolling
into the crater created by my snow shoe.
Then I saw a half-chewed burdock pod and scores of shells and hulls
desperately ransacked of any trace of food that might remain. Then I noticed the tracks – animal tracks
were everywhere. The landscape was
dotted with drag-footed, cloven hoof prints that pierced through the snow, some
so big that I could imagine the great, elusive buck that must have left them. The deer trails, scores of them, converged at
the creek, crossing the thick ice as safely as Moses led the Israelites across
the Red Sea. The deep, purposeful deer
tracks were juxtaposed by the soft, zig-zaggy, hip-hoppy prints of the field mice
that meandered from seed pod to seed pod, searching for a hearty winter meal. I couldn't help but think that the world was alive and well, even in the dead of winter.
