The first real snow of the season came last week. I looked out the window and immediately received the message; time to bundle up and get to work on the first snow inspection of the year.
My responsibility, as it is every year, is to check on this part of the natural world where I live.
Temperatures can vary widely on a first snow inspection. That day the thermometer read 4 degrees. Becky, Luna and I step outside in the frozen morning sunlight with Luna squeezing herself out the door first, as usual. The two humans wear hats and scarves Becky has been knitting during our self-imposed COVID isolation. Luna is wrapped in her thick and golden fur. She seems comfortable with the cold.
On our way down the long driveway, Becky throws a ball she brought along and Luna races after it. We do this a few times as we continue to the road. County salt trucks came by early and the snow was scrapped from much of the surface. Melting crystals deposited by the trucks sparkle an unnatural green in the sunlight. The white snow blanketing the surrounding glitters pure in response.
We are looking for places that exhibit only a slight human fingerprint. I know at one time this area harbored a farm of some sort, and kept a few animals that required some fencing. The rusty broken remnants of these wire fences are still visible through tangles of underbrush beneath the hardwood trees on the hillsides. Jagged clumps of old concrete structures will sometimes turn up while digging new holes in the land. But in some places, it is once again going back to nature. I think of a quote by the Greek writer Horace during Julius Caesar’s time: “You can drive out nature with a pitchfork, but she keeps on coming back.”
To all animals, Luna included, property lines matter even less than normal during snowy weather. Like the birds, the deer and the turkey around here, Luna is led and moves according to other forces.
Not too many animal tracks on that morning walk. Maybe because of the cold. A few birds had made crosshatches, little hieroglyphics on the very top surface of the snow pack. At a shady turn in the road, a tiny something had burrowed underneath the packed snow looking, I would guess, for either food or shelter or both. Life keeps quietly going forward.
Back at the house, I observe the birds at the feeder eating the suet and seeds we put out. I want to say they are enjoying it, but that might be putting too human a spin on it.
Some measure time by charting numbers in little squares on pages. Others measure time by the turn of the season and the spin of the world. Such natural changes are what I am looking for on this first snow inspection. I look out at the snow and the trees all around me and steal some ideas from Robert Frost.
Whose woods these are I think I know.
The squirrels scamper to and fro
The animals see me stopping here
Observing how much I just don’t know
Under the snow digging secret paths
Beings work their animal math
Birds write their plans on the surface
And carry on without anger or wrath
Sniffing Luna might see it a snag
A human fence makes her zig and then zag
But she moves on without stop or pause
Til something new starts her tail to wag
Deer tracks lead to a secret abode
Woodpeckers tap their hidden code
Perhaps nature is waiting us out
To go back to a more natural mode
Norman Knight, a retired Clark-Pleasant Middle School teacher, writes this weekly column for the Daily Journal. Send comments to [email protected].
