View from the Crooked Lake Trail, Pinckney Recreation Area.
It’s Wednesday night and I’m off work for the rest of the week, so I poured myself a scotch. Don’t judge. I like the cheap stuff. My dog, Charlie, is fluffing up her bed. I was listening to some music but I turned it off to enjoy a few minutes of peace and quiet. Now there’s just the sound of the furnace running and a few mechanical noises coming from the dishwasher. I’ve been thinking a lot about the peaceful nature of winter. Sure there are some signs of life but for the most part everything is dormant. I happen to love the fact that I can sit outside in winter and not be bothered by mosquitos, ticks or biting flies. The only real concern is not freezing..ha! Staying warm in freezing temps doesn’t seem that difficult now. However, it took a long time to learn how to stay warm. I’ve made a lot of mistakes. What I learned was this. There’s no such thing as bad weather; just bad gear and winter is a bad time to make mistakes.
Most animals in the wild are perfectly adapted to surviving in cold weather, but with domesticated humans it takes practice. I admire wolves when I see them (on tv) saunter across a frozen landscape. That is the ultimate goal…to learn how to saunter in winter. To saunter is to walk in a slow, relaxed manner, without hurry or effort. To saunter is to live in the moment. On the other hand when you’re so cold you can think of nothing more than the pain in your extremities from the bitter cold that is also living in the moment. It’s just not as fun. So stay warm folks and saunter on.
The Heron 