Sunday, January 16, 2011


Minus 16 C, and a bit of a wind from the North West: My wife’s sciatica is flaring up so she has an excuse. The Beagle says “Listen, I am a short haired opportunistic scavenger with cute dangling ears. I have been outside and done what you so euphemistically refer to as number one and number two. I can work you like a string puppet show in The Sound of Music. But given the choice of laying alongside a warm fire or stomping through the snow, I the Dumb Animal will lay by the fire” (Beagles are so dramatic)
So it was off by myself for my work out walk. The snow was newly fallen, about 6 centimetres or so, and the texture was a bit like the foam of white water; it was neither liquid, solid, or gas but had a translucence and texture that seemed transient. When I stepped through it the snow would faintly protest with an audible crunching groan and where I had stepped, the texture totally changed leaving behind very distinct Sorel tracks. In an ordinary year I would have left snowshoe or ski tracks but not yet this year. But I was not the only critter that had been in the Valley since the overnight snow stopped. Little voles or mice, rabbits, and likely a deer had made tracks as well.
This time the silence of last week of last week was replaced by a murmuring of wind. It really was white noise as the snow was reflecting the sun back towards the blue sky with full vigour which made the snow brighter and whiter than the backside of Gabriel himself. (NB – I have seen plenty of angels, the UOHI is full of them, but not the Big Guys like Michael or Gabriel so it is an assumption on my part their posteriors are very white - also note the joke ASSumption – get it?) . Anyway, the snow was white and the wind was murmuring and the whole thing was very peaceful.
Well, peaceful but cold; I had to move briskly. I looked at the snowmobile tracks that reached out boldly onto the frozen Madawaska and was tempted to follow but did not. There is word that there still is lots of water in Bark Lake up in the Algonquin Highlands and that this water is still making its way to the Ottawa River via the frozen River that was tempting me to tread on it. That means that beneath the serenity of the ice there are conflicts and issues and resentments and ….. well there is active water at least. I will leave river walking for another day.
On the way back I am walking into the wind. It is not a particularly harsh wind but it does caress my face into a benign numbness. I trudge the road more briskly.
So I make my way home to a warm fireplace , mint tea, and a sleeping beagle. I am sure this is my imagination but he seems to open one eye and then a look of glee illuminates his face. I am not sure if he is glad that I am home or he is just glad that he did not join me.

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