When the Land Froze Over

A diary of a winter's memory.

When the snow came

We are currently residing on the southern coast of British Columbia, a new home that has held us sweetly during a transitioning time in our lives. Supposedly, winters are mild and wet here. Temperatures don’t normally drop below the negatives, and when they do, very rarely below -10. So imagine everybody’s surprise when it dipped below -15 last week. For someone who grew up in Ontario, that didn’t sound like anything out of the ordinary - there was even excitement - until I saw everybody scurrying about not quite sure what to do with themselves in preparation for this coming shift. Preparation is good. It is important. Yet when it comes, all you can do is let it. Witness. Be a part of its unfolding. 

And so it was, in this way, that the land froze over. 

The day before we could feel it in the air, it felt crisper than usual. As though it turned into ice gems in the lungs. As though we walked through living glaciers caught on the breeze. We prepared the animals, making sure they would be warm enough. To the surprise of everyone on the farm one of our hens carried into the world two little chicks. A big wow in the cold dark days of January. We tucked them into a little hutch and they seemed rather content to be safe and taken care of. We stocked up as much wood as we could by the stove, tucked ourselves into our own little hutch and hunkered down for the weekend. 

It came like a sweet sigh from the parted lips of a lover, as though the earth herself groaned a delectable release of pleasure. And then there was completeness. A sort of fulfillment of the land into winter's embrace. Finally arriving in her arms.

Oh sweet frozen land, I have been waiting for you. 

Walking out into this day felt as though all of life lay suspended within a held breath. The birds were silent, the squirrels hidden. The air itself was unmoving. No breeze dared to break the quietude. The only sound that passed through the land was ground crunching under boots, crackling in frozen eternity. Everything lay fastened to whatever it was closest to. The land was held in ice. 

The cows out in the sodden snowy rain

The nights seem darker here, as though the cold allows a deepening space for the dark’s solitude. The stars too came out to play their heavenly melodies, this time, in absolute clarity. As though the stillness made it possible for them to be seen more clearly. They glow in the distant spaces to comfort the night. A reminder of the light that still lives upon the frozen land. You can see it reflected in the eyes of frozen lakes and ponds, where all of life may be reflected in their lucency. Creatures gaze up at the stars and remember their place in the world. I looked up at them in the crisp darkness and saw eternity expanding into the night’s nothingness. 

The next day the birds came out again, suddenly reawakened with a new spark of energy. Seizing the opportunity to forage, as seeds fall from the trees and land distinctly on frost. Seeing nourishment where others see barren land. I saw them twinkling about frosted branches and locked ground, joyous in their frolicking. Enjoying the solitude as other creatures lay still in their dens. The breeze ever so gently arrived again, softly caressing the trees, gentle in the ways he woke them from their glacial night. The land awakens again from the profundity of ancient ice. 

Ice is an old creature indeed. One that brings depth through suspension. Locked in an eternal stillness, yet moving in haunting dances across the land. Their moans and groans ghostly whispers of time long past. The pond outside our home froze seemingly solid and we took the opportunity to walk on what otherwise would be unavailable to us. That is something I love about ice and frozen lakes, you are walking on water in the most enchantingly wondrous ways. Held upon pure crystalline ground. Sometimes we would take a step and hear a deep, rolling moan in the ice. A kind of cracking and crocking, as though the ancient voice of first creature stirred in the depths. It is a low, grumbling sound. A crackling that touches the very same crystalline water that lives inside of you, and stirs it into gleaming icicles. 

My winter wonderland walk

I could see the detailed stands of ice that formed into a whole solid layer upon the ponds. Strand by strand, they expand into glorious patterns of starried treasures. The strands of god. A child of earth and heavenly intelligence. 

A moment laid still upon the land. The nights were held in a sort of tranquillity that only the freeze can bring. Things slow down the colder it gets. Time itself slows and halts in greeting. The true call of winter. Her bells ring. Her carriage clangs. Frost woman arrives. With each step, a frozen land is born. Oh, how I have missed this sort of depth. 

Then.....the snow comes 

Blanketing the land in the wings of the angels. 

I delight in the ways snow brings warmth. Insulation from the stars. The great arms of winter stretch open to hold close and warm all creatures. One of my favourite things in life is walking out on the land in the middle of a snowstorm. Oh, the enchantment! How it lights my heart so completely, I feel like I'm a few breaths off the ground in giddiness. As though a love spell is cast and you can't help but fall into it with everything you are. 

If you listen, the land gets quiet. But in a different sort of quiet than the freeze. Not as complete as frost, which is held in the placidity of the void. It is softer. The only sound heard is the soft sparkling of snow falling to the ground. Glimmers of lights. It lands in my hair and upon my eyelashes in greeting, and my heart sings. In a matter of moments, the land is transformed. Another world completely. One is transported into the realm of snow. 

Yet this snow comes and goes in a few days. The snowy crystal land doesn't last for too long until the rains come to wash it away. What's left is a soggy landscape that seems to enunciate the matter of living in the rainforest. The mist rolls in carrying dampness in the air. The ground squishes beneath boots and reels you into the sodden wet earth like a mischievous spirit wanting to play in the mud. There is no escaping their whims. It is a watery realm. No wonder this element is often associated with winter. The land is a rolling river of wet soil and moisture. Of crystalline water and adamantine frost.

I wonder what it feels like to be laid beneath the covering of snow. What is it like to feel the icy sensation on my body, yet not feel cold? To feel that frosted blade pierce straight into me, into all of me, embracing me so completely that I myself become ice. What would that feel like? How does the land relish in being taken by the heavens so perfectly? Do the lakes adore the ways they transform into something solid? Does the land remember her days of warm nakedness when she is cloaked with the coverings of snow and frost? 

I wonder how the land remains in this state sometimes all winter… that is something I have never felt the depth of. Land held so thoroughly by the snow. How scrumptious that would be. 

For now, the rains come to wash it all away, as though it never was. The people go back to their usual business. Not a trace is left. The recollection of it remains within the penitences of my heart, and the land’s microbial memory. 

A few days after the snow, mostly melted. The mist rolls in on the soft breeze and the rain comes.

Some other land musings ~

Weaving Winter's Medicine

The Alchemy of the Land

A Practice of Communing

Meeting the Dark Crone