March Snow

And so it snows.

Pictures and more

I just spent this evening with my dear friend Ruth. We looked through photo albums from Choteau, Montana where Ruth was born in 1909. Our friend, Patricia, unearthed the albums, an ancient suitcase, and an exquisite handbag from Ruth's attic today. So tonight, Ruth and I looked through one of the albums. She had not seen it in years. In this album, all the photographs were taken in Choteau between 1903-1913. It was interesting to sit with Ruth as she looked through pictures of her hometown, the jail was here, she'd say, we lived down this street, over there. The pictures were full of men on horses, men posing in front of a herd of sheep, men sitting atop a wagonload of wool, a dozen horses harnessed and ready to pull out of town (25,ooo pounds of wool was written below the picture in Ruth's mother's careful hand). There were photographs of Charlie Russel paintings, pictures of Flathead Indian encapments, and landscape photos of gulches and canyons, waterfalls and peaks.

It was incredible to open this book with Ruth and see bits of what she saw, see the care her mother had taken in composing shots and laying out the album. When I came home, I started back to work on an essay I've been fiddling with about growing up in Ipswich and, while trying to think of the way to describe the pleasing simplicity of First Period houses, found myself thumbing through photos. I hadn't meant to mimic with myself what I had just witnessed with Ruth, and, oddly enough, didn't think about the concurrence until later. But the activity of looking at scenes so familiar made me realize the odd impossiblity of ever communicating the fullness of what is meant by we lived down this street, over there.

There is not much to report from our wing of the world. Seth continues in his pursuit of all things sport, while Corin continues with craft projects and imaginary play (the living room was a zoo today and Seth a rabbit - you can guess who the zookeeper was). Yesterday, we marked Corin's half-birthday and, this morning, he was pleased to find he could still fit into his nook on the counter despite now being five and a half. Since he was proud of his half birthday he decided it should also be the birthday of his current favorite stuffed animal, Stripes the Dragon. Corin proceeded to host a birthday party for Stripes complete with party hats he made and several presents wrapped in the majority of his beddding (which somehow had migrated to the living room). Despite my protestations that the cupcakes I baked were for St. Patty's Day, Corin somehow transformed the evening into a celebration of Stripes and by the end Than, Kara, Tim and I found ourselves chorusing Happy Birthday to a stuffed animal. We drew the line at lighting a candle for Stripes to blow out, relying on the logic that, as a dragon, Stripes blows fire and thus would have difficulty de-flaming the wick. And so goes life with a child gifted dually with a full-bodied imagination and the powers of persausion to draw us all along.

Stripes' Birthday Hat

On Saturday, Seth was lent a skateboard from his buddy Marquez and has spent every day since his prize borrow practicing the technique. So far, he seems to be gaining a knack for powering it along and has completely mastered the art of the dramatic fall. Recently, Seth also built a bike trailer for his indoor trike, which is useful for giving Eeyore rides. Between the two of my boys, I am continually amazed at what they come up with and how they are each so entirely, unmistakably, themselves. Besides keeping me on my toes, they keep me full of humor (most days!) and always in fresh wonder.

Boarding

Bike Tralier


The Biking Man

Midwinter spring is its own season...

....There's a little Eliot for all you fans of Four Quartets. And as the good Thomas Stearns wrote about this season, "Between melting and freezing/ The soul's sap quivers." We have indeed landed in the season full of betweens. We wake one morning to hearty frost flowers and the next finds us hatless, tromping through melt and mud. Robins have joined the waxwings and, from time to time, I hear a honking overhead and find Canada geese passing high and away, tending north.

Today, the boys and I walked with some friends along the river. The trail was a patchwork of thawing snow, muddy ground, and gravelly patches. The northhills, lit against a deep slate sky, seemed straw colored, gold-like, rather than frosty, and all the red-twigged willow along the riverbank flared brightly. The soul's sap does seem to quiver in these days, reaching toward spring and all its attendant renewal. Though I love the winter palette and the snap of cold that makes me sit up and pay attention, I start feeling like an animal pacing its pen after awhile. The relentless melt and freeze, the sodden mud of the turning season demands a sort of amiability with transition that I can only sometimes muster. Our friend, Jack, calls this season Sprinter. And while indeed a unique hybrid, the name with its intimations of swiftness is a bit misleading. We had snow in June last year and not a freak storm but the tail end of months of near daily rain/snow/hail squalls, so perhaps this stretching, in between sort of season should be called Marathoner as it does indeed demand endurance.

The kids too are feeling the midwinter spring in their own ways. Seth clamors regularly to ride his new bike, a business which depends on me standing about on the sidewalk to push him every few meters. Thus, his riding and my having the time and mental clarity to stand in front of the house for half hours on end must coincide, and when they don't he stamps his feet and pulls at the door before turning to ride his indoor trike like a terror across the house.

Meanwhile, Corin, my perpetual nester, hunkers on our wide window seat, known in our house as the Owl's Nest, and plays CDs at full volume while coloring pictures of rocketships. At this point into our partial thaw, I could paper the boys' room and half the hall with rockets depicted in various space scenes (It's a rocket and the sun. It's a rocket and Jupiter. It's a rocket and Saturn. It's a rocket and Pluto [pronounced Plu-doo in this house]). Mostly I have been heartlessly papering the recycling bin. The other day, my mother called me from the far end of a closet cleaning project to ask if I wanted any of the artwork I had produced as a young child and which she had saved, lo, these thirty years. "Mother," I replied (horror cracking my voice), "Don't you dare."

But, whether or not the sun has come out to play, we try to pile out of the house, finding that any outing is good for us. Yesterday, the sun was gloriously out, and while the east coast was being pounded with snow, we had fifty-three degrees with high blue skies. The boys and I drove up to the local farm where Than works. We stood on hay bales listening to the pigs grunt around their slop, then walked the muddy two-track to the hoop house. Inside, 300 heritage breed chicks scuttled around heat lamps and water dispensers. Outside the chick nursery, a squadron of bees buzzed about the grain grinder, their dark bodies zigzagging near us before veering sharply away. Corin, hatless, coatless, and muddy-shoed, surveyed the bees like a man in a dream. When he caught me watching him, he smiled and said with a happy hush: "Just like summer!"

Hockey Guy

A game of chase in the North Hills


Out for a walk

The view from here

It is still January, the month that goes on and on. I thought I'd catch up with some pictures from the past few weeks. The view from here is full winter. I keep coming upon flocks of cedar waxwings chirruping their high pitched "bzeee" from the top of a cottonwood or between the berries of a mountain ash. I know they winter over in Montana, but somehow they make me hopeful for spring. Is it too soon? I think I can answer my own question: it surely too soon to even let that word flutter around my mind. And yet the sight of the waxwings does seem to warm me.

Goldeneyes, on the other hand, make me frigid. On Sunday afternoon, we all walked along the Clark Fork River in the middle of town. Great floats of ice drifted west with the current and a strong wind blew out of Hellgate canyon, sweeping down the riverfront. As I looked at the river, I noticed dabbling peaceably mid-river were a brace of goldeneyes. Unlike mallards, these ducks dive entirely under the water, making small fishlike flops as they arc under the current. Bundled in my boots, coat, hat, gloves and scarf, I felt a little awed by the goldeneyes and their adaptation to such a living. I should think there were easier ways to go about the business of survival - flying south for instance - but evidently it must work for them, and the competition for this coldwater niche didn't seem so tight. Let's hear it for feathers and a nice layer of fat.

We have only had a slight dusting of snow since our last big drop a few weeks ago. I'm hopeful for another round so we can again hit the local ski trails. Until that happens, we will continue to content ourselves with walks. Than and I took advantage of some sunshine the other day to walk the boys up Waterworks Hill. Though it was sunny on the northside of the hill, the Missoula valley was still socked in with an Inversion (capitalized because it is certainly a presence, if not a proper proper noun). If you don't know what that is, count yourself fortunate. Let's just say when an inversion is caught in the valley we can be socked in for days. When this happens I find myself thinking, "I seem to remember there was a mountain around here somewhere. Now where did it go?" When the inversion thinned enough above our neighborhood for us to remember where the mountains stand, Than and I ran the boys up top. Actually, Corin ran himself and remarkably speedily too. Seth had to be carried as he accidently left the house in one of his shoes and one of Corin's (if you would like to know how that happened, you may direct your inquiries to his Uncle Than) . The following pictures are from our delightful walk.

Looking into the Inversion

The view the other way


A Frosted Mount Jumbo

100 Years Young

Our dear friend, Ruth, turned 100 today. Twenty or so people gathered at her home to celebrate this momentous birthday. The Missoulian even pitched in by running a feature on our special Centenarian. For the past two and half years, I have been making meals for Ruth two nights a week. What I thought was going to be a part time job, has turned into an incredible gift: a friendship with Ruth that is immeasurably important for me, and the chance to be part of an amazing group of people - the community of folk that love and care for Ruth.

Ruth and Patricia

Ruth sees opportunities for joy everywhere. Everyday things - the colors in her garden in the summer, the taste of a fresh strawberry, the light flooding in from her front window, a glass of warm milk at bedtime, the voice of a friend reading the paper aloud, the neighbor's cat who pops in for a visit, the blooms of the forsythia her mother planted - are all cause enough for simple and profound joy. There are fresh beauties all around, if you care to look. Ruth, who rarely leaves her home and lives almost completely in three rooms, has taught me to see the expansiveness of what is before me, even when, or perhaps especially when, it can seem so small, so limited. I cherish my dear friend: all the cups of tea we've shared, all the books we've read together, all the times we've just sat watching sparrows pick seed from the feeder, each moment unfolding simply, beautifully before us.

Friends enjoying one another

Skiing!

Than and Kara and I took the boys for a ski yesterday - well, we skied and the boys rode along, Seth snoozing and Corin enjoying the sleigh ride. "The horse knows the way to carry the sleigh through the white and drifting snow. Oh, over the river and through the woods... " In this case I was the horse attached to the buggy. But what a beautiful afternoon it was. It snowed while we were skiing and the trees kept sloughing great heaps from their boughs. Even though I was huffing it up hill and down, it felt great to be out amongst the trees, alongside the creek, in the twisting snow.

Doubling as a Pack Horse

Kara on skis

Than and Kara: Stopping By the Woods on a Snowy Afternoon

Happy Birthday Seth

On Saturday, we wound down our holiday season by celebrating Seth's third birthday. Seth's birthday arrives right when I am ready to be done with festivities, so the poor guy gets a bit of a short shrift. However, we did manage to make some birthday cupcakes, light some candles and throw together a bit of a party. It all turned out and he was pleased to finally be three, an age to which he has been aspiring since Corin had his birthday in September.

After two weeks of vacation, festivities, Christmas, New Years, birthday, sledding, and snow, I awoke this morning with one thought in my mind: routine! Monday morning, I salute you. Peanut butter and jelly packed in a dinosaur lunch sack, I salute you. Hats and coats and mittens and snowpants, I salute you. School drop-off, I salute you. I am always glad to see the holidays come and always glad to watch them go. I love feeling my days and weeks restored to their normal course, like a river regaining its banks. And so, not without gratitude for the past few weeks of holiday-time, I was pleased to take my children each to their respective schools this morning, and come home for a few hours of work. For everything, there is a season.

On another note, I received a bird book for Christmas that is filled with recorded bird calls. Seth loves the call of the Willow Ptarmigan and won't let us turn the page or play any other call. Over dinner this evening, we found ourselves trying to imitate the call with varying degrees of success. Tim was the unqualified winner, though Seth also does a creditable job. I highly recommend that you listen to the sound of the willow ptarmigan at this link: http://www.birds.cornell.edu/AllAboutBirds/audio/Willow_Ptarmigan.html

If you listen to the link, you'll have some idea of what our dinner table sounded like this evening. You are welcome to join us for dinner any evening, price of admission: one Willow Ptarmigan imitation.

Happy New Year to each of you.