One Fine day

Up came the sun and out the door I went, snowshoes and poles in hand to join my brother on an expedition through fields and woods, taking advantage of the clear, bright day before the weather turns nasty again on Friday.

Expedition leader/brother

We began at the entrance to a meadow near his house, a place where we both played as children. A small stream, a frozen slip of water where we used to have ice skating races, still makes its way through the field. In summer it provides a drinking spot for birds, deer, coyotes, and assorted other wildlife. Today it was snow covered and silent and the cattails rattled in the wind.

We left the open field for the relative warmth of the woods where the leafless trees broke the wind but still let in plenty of sunlight. We tromped side by side until the path narrowed. I stopped to watch a bird flit through the trees and inadvertently turned my right foot. When I started off again I fell face first into the snow - I'd stepped on the edge of my left snowshoe and could not lift it! My brother turned to see me rising ignominiously and grinned.

Snow is still deep in these woods

The wind did not reach us here and I was soon too warm in my fur trimmed hood and down parka. I removed my gloves, unzipped my coat, and tromped happily along. There are little pools of snowmelt at the edges of trails, and I spied the purple-green sworl of a skunk cabbage rising from the sunniest of them.

my $5 summer tag sale find

There won't be too many more snowshoeing weekends before the warming sun melts the deep snow. Then I will don my rubber boots and set off through the fields and woods, looking in earnest for signs of spring. By then, the skunk cabbage will be in full bloom and the birds will be singing hurrah!