cashes-valley

cashes-valley, originally uploaded by sparakeet.

On the eve of the first legitimate snowfall this year,
i headed north, leaving a city glittering with Christmas lights in the rear view.
the drive on hwy 2 was all currier and ives.
hemlocks heavy with snow slumped in a storybook way.
cashes valley was a vast undisturbed blanket of white seemingly inhabited by only a small paint horse.
The flakes were beginning to obscure the shaggy brown spots on his back. an hour or two from now he may
be mistaken for a white horse.
A blue grey sky was revealed as the road opened up
and looked bright compared to the darkness of
the cohuttas ahead.
Shrouded in heavy clouds, i knew the better snow was yet to come.

At the cabin i discovered tiny tracks in the snow -birds and
small mammals.
Puffy squirrels waited patiently for their peanuts.
quiet because the snow buffers sound -the road empty of redneck vehicles.
the entire landscape around me was immaculate, the cleaness of snow working its minimalist magic.
it feels as though i have the entire forest to myself
and it speaks to me in snaps, crow calls and feathery evergreen songs.
The creek looks like a japanese painting,
a classic zen scene of rock, snow, moving water
and rhododendron heavy with ice.
I saw the red-tailed hawk in his y-tree perch
and a rabbit on the high part of my driveway.
Black sticks colonized with frilly botanica colored lichens line the landscape
and my breath seems to hang in the air like a frozen sculpture.
i stay out as long as the wind chill allows, just long enough to see
a slate colored junco take his last seed and fly off over the cabin