Maybe the only cool thing about lingering snow is that it works almost as a census taker. In town you call tell who doesn't drive very often by the sheets of snow on their cars; some people have pristine yards, proof that they either don't have children (or a sense of child-like wonder) or that their children were too preoccupied with new Christmas video games to bother with sleds and snow pants.
In the woods you notice that for some reason Upper and Lower Sycamore are the most heavily traveled trails; that lots of people are trying out their shiny new hiking poles or xc skis; that there's some fascinating carcass or excrement down below Mountains-to-Sea that has all the dogs investigating; that only one person has been dumb enough to ride Grassy and she was running a Captain in the front and a Sauserwind in the back. Best of all, you see evidence that families make full use of the forest--and each tiny set of bootprints trudging behind grown-up size steps, with paw prints dancing in and out among the human, is a little love letter to Pisgah.
Wow that was deep
ReplyDeleteyour mom is deep
ReplyDeleteI went out biking with a friend on Sunday, and we didn't see any tracks on Black from Buckhorn to Club. Almost all of the snow had melted, minus a few large drifts that were up to a foot deep!
ReplyDeleteDid you see mine and Thad's tracks on the Art Loeb? Oh yes, the Squirrel went trail running.