Today I walked in the valley just behind our house. I did not walk alone, and I am not counting the spiritual beings and powers that no doubt walk every step with me. My wife and The Beagle walked with me today.

That luxury, at least the valley part, did not exist a year ago. I was in anticipation of my coronary bypass, sticking nitro patches on my above-the-waist body, and carrying a little spray bottle of nitro-glycerine as well – just in case. It would be unfair and inaccurate to say that walking for me was forbidden but walking 500 + meters off any beaten path in a valley would have made me and those who loved me nervous, so I chose not to do it then.

But a year later things are different. I am enjoying the Gift of Life. So today, a Saturday, was a day of light snow. We slept in; all of us - my wife, me, The Beagle and all four cats. Then I was lucky enough to make breakfast. I layered strawberry yogurt in the bottom of a large clear glass cup and positioned a floor of raw almonds above that layer. Then I cooked up porridge of steel cut oats softened with some large flake oatmeal and some Cream of Wheat and carefully built that up as the top stratum. It was a nice treat that made me thankful for having the resources to make this, the spare time to be able to think of this, the frivolity to have fun with breakfast, the teachings of my dietitian to make something healthy, and the blessing to be able to share the meal with my spouse.

Fortified with food we hit the trail: Originally we had thought of snowshoeing but there is insufficient snow on the ground for that, but no matter, we just plain walked. Well not really plain walked, as The Beagle came along on his extended clothesline leash. It was about -8 C with a light wind and constantly powdering of snow, as if the Great Baker herself was finishing off some cupcakes with a light dusting of fine sugar.

The walking was easy but the doggy wanted to follow the path least direct. He sees little point in the straight line, along a path. He sees and smells what the rest of us pay no heed to at all, so the walk was meandering, stopping many times for him to half bury his head in the snow to look or sniff for something. We saw abandoned birds' nests not 4 feet from the ground. At first blush one thinks that this a silly place to build a nest, but a nest in the middle of a thicket of hawthorn bushes in the height of summer is a Fortress Mighty. There are also what my wife and I call the Condos. Trees that no longer flower or leaf but still stand tall. Guys (both winged and unwinged) dig holes in the softening wood. Picture a raging blizzard and you are in a wooden cave, a few woodshavings help insulate the space and you puff up your feathers and fur and fall into a deep, deep, slumber. Maybe most humans would prefer a night at the Holiday Inn Express but the critters don’t add to climate change with what they do.

The valley that we trudged is a wet land much of the summer so we were walking on snow covered ice a lot of the time. The cattails stood tall, brown, and proud and barely wavered in the wind. A lot of the seed heads were still there and were acting like a catcher’s mitt for the snow; it was like there was a contest of who could be whiter and fluffier, the seeds of autumn or the newly caught snow.
And so the walk went, up, down, stop, go, to the left, to the right, forwards, backwards. Snow falls silently and in fact, acts like a big acoustic sponge so there was no extraneous sound. There was no one in the universe except for The Beagle, my wife, the snow, the valley, and the sound of our footfalls. And I could not be happier or more grateful.