Wander | The Last Hurrah

Across the snow

In a week of warming days, the sun licked up all the snow, leaving the landscape bare and barren, waiting. Canada geese honked in their hurried flight past. Robins arrived. The earth squelched. Then, a rogue storm rolled over the mountain, sinking snow-laden clouds down to the ground. Overnight, its belly split and a torrent of white fell over the land.

The last hurrah.

I pushed aside every plan and headed up the mountain road, into the gap between the faces. Beside the river, as the morning sun printed shadows and Maggie Mae ran in circles, I snapped in for the last ski of the year.

The world was pristine, draped in diamonds, encrusted in glitter, embellished in crystal. I glided through the glamor of it all. All was calm, serene, powdered, and cold.

An eagle swooped from his perch on the limb of a gnarled cottonwood and flew upstream. Across the river, old man Jack’s cabin, his porch, his steps, his car, were still covered in snow. His curtains were drawn; he’d not yet stirred on this snow-laden day. I skied on.

The sun rose higher, spilling warmth, softening the snow, slowly milking water from the tips of evergreen leaves. Puddles in the road that had lain overnight beneath the blanket of snow, slowly seeped through, now liquid patches the color of chocolate milk.

From the sheltered overhang of a giant stone ran the stitched pattern of tiny feet. A mouse had woken, stretched, preened her whiskers, then scurried out. A second line of prints showed her return.

I turned a loop and headed back, too, down the tracks I’d just made. The warming snow grabbed my skis, pulled a stuttering brake. I stopped and kicked, clearing the clumping, sticking snow. Maggie Mae stopped too, and pulled snowballs from her paws. We skied on. In the shadows, we skied faster. In the sun, the snow was starting to sink.

The quiet of our departure had turned to the sound of dripping by our return. Dripping, dripping. Water coming from snow.

The last hurrah.