Day 5 Outdoors: On High Ground, Creekside

Tuesday, January 31, 1:40-3:15 p.m.

Mild temperatures brought a serious thaw, reducing snow on the ground and increasing snowmelt. The small stream north of our farmhouse has no name but shows on county maps, its source not far east, over on the other side of Jelinek Road. From there it meanders through orchard, woods, open fields and more woods. Small and easily overlooked, it nevertheless offers a great deal of variety along a relatively short length.

Flowing briefly north at the base of wooded hills to the east, the stream crosses a low, waterlogged area (not a fully developed bog or marsh but soggy walking) before falling in a very minor cataract to a lower level, and there it enters another small bit of woods and turns west again. A few cedars and pines crowd the north bank, rising to a large stand of pines further uphill. 

Wild roses and red osiers tangle among fallen trees and branches on the south bank as the stream cuts deeper, heading for a wide, low area overhung with old willows. Beyond the willows it crosses open land, through an old homestead and cattle pasture, before flowing beneath the highway and through more woods to reach Lake Michigan.

The sheltered stretch between insignificant waterfall and giant willows attracts wildlife, and their tracks through the snow—deer and coyote, mostly—come at the creek almost at right angles, trails purposeful and straight from orchard and across meadow. The surface of the snow, both in the open and under the trees, is dimpled now with small craters, shrunken heavily down to earth, pulled by the weight of crystals becoming liquid again. As the crystals melt, they leave their impurities behind. Trees here are on the scrubby side—small, lichen-garbed maples, shallow-rooted quaking aspen (locally known as ‘popple’), young ash trees and now and again a black cherry, straight and tall, its high clusters of fruit black now in midwinter. Many trees have lost limbs. Some entire trees have been felled by wind since autumn. At the base of each standing tree today is a hollow in the snow.

In the current thaw, the little creek itself, ice-covered four weeks ago, is darkly visible between its steep, snowy, brush-tangled banks. Certain stretches look almost still, reflecting as perfectly as a mirror the branches above, silt and dead leaves settled to the bottom, a bed that shows dark brown, almost black beneath the clear, cold water. In other stretches, where the flow is obstructed by fallen branches or tumbles of rock, the creek talks quietly to itself. Those sounds today are too slight to be called gurgling. The word purling describes the sound better. A quiet, gentle murmur.

When the breeze catches them, dangling clusters of tiny rosehips (red, orange, yellow) bounce in the winter air, while high off the ground the top branches of pine trees sway in a stronger wind, sending their sharp, resiny odor abroad in soft, passing bursts. The wind has left the mark of its work on several trees—places where a neighboring branch has rubbed and rubbed, sanding away the bark to expose the underlying cambium layer.

Here on the south bank, outside the tangle of trees, there are dry grasses, Queen-Anne’s-lace and thistles bobbing and whispering in intermittent sunlight. Each thistle is a miracle of complexity.

From out on the highway comes the noise of traffic. From far to the southwest, southwest of Claudia’s woods, comes the yipping of coyotes.

Between Times: In Sleep, in Dreams, and Waking

As I observed only yesterday morning to David over our morning coffee, my outdoor stillness project, although only a one-hour-a-week commitment and with only one outdoor sitting-still hour yet accomplished, has already changed my mental landscape in a wondrous way. Instead of waking to sleepy thoughts of bills that need paying, I find my sleep-to-waking transition is often now a dreamy slideshow of outdoor scenes close to home. (And the bills still get paid, without polluting my morning mind.) Still snug in bed and half asleep, in my mind I am already outdoors, taking up one position after another, moving with the speed of thought from “my” wild apple tree on Novotny Road to a wooded hillside high above the no-name creek to a sheltered nook in the treeline between sections of orchard, picturing every spot from various points of view, settling into being there—until the next moment, when I am in some other precious nearby neighborhood spot. Perhaps this is the key to my new year’s cheerfulness, my days beginning in this exciting but peaceful manner. 

This morning, however, was different, as I woke from a nightmare: It was summer, and the vegetable garden was lush, the lindens and maples and black walnut tree providing welcome shade--and then I looked to the east and could not understand what I was seeing. The edge of the woods beyond the cherry orchard looked like the ragged edge of a cliff, with nothing behind it. I stared and stared, trying to get my mind to interpret what my eyes were reporting. Then I realized that the woods had been completely bulldozed away! It was unbelievable horror, the kind a war survivor would feel to see her city bombed to rubble.

Needless to say, there was no temptation to luxuriate this morning in that usually-delicious zone between sleeping and waking! Much better today to be fully awake, my little world not transformed but still its simple, modest, familiar, wonderful self.

Day 1 Outdoors

Tuesday, January 3, 8:15-9:15 a.m.

It was daybreak without sunrise, overcast. The fierce, brutal winds that blasted through the first two days of the year had largely abated, but the air was very cold. At the tree line, on the edge of the field above the stream, only a gentle breeze moved. Most of the time it seemed to come from the north, but at times it would pulse gently, as if the atmosphere were breathing, and then it would shift and gust.

The snowflakes fell lazily, sometimes sparsely, sometimes more thickly, until a breezy gust blew them horizontal. Then they looked more like asteroids streaming through space than water crystals. Overhead, against a light grey sky, they looked dark, like bits of airborne litter or ash. Once for a few minutes the clouds parted to let a bit of blue sky through, but then they closed again. Shifts in wind and changes in light were all small, undramatic, scarcely noticeable. 

Except for the slow, slight swaying of the tallest popple trees, the only living things stirring were black-capped chickadees. At first there were half a dozen of them, flitting and chipping, up in the highest branches, searching for food. After a while, there were none, and no other birds took their place.

Once in a while a heavy load of snow on a slender branch exploded in a tiny, noiseless puff and tumbled to the ground.

Leaves of grasses curled against the white ground like Arabic writing. Each dried umbel of Queen-Anne’s-lace held a small mound of snow within its curved ribs, and no two of these intricate snow-catchers were the same.

Our little nameless stream was hidden beneath the snow. No sound of the stream’s trickling challenged the wind, but the low, deep, rumbling roar of Lake Michigan, its waters still tossing from two days of wind, never ceased.

Later, at 10 o’clock, the temperature for Northport was recorded at 14 degrees Fahrenheit.