I was shocked at how few people I saw out given how gorgeous it was: the low golden light, the blue shadows, the dusty and crystalline snow kicked up with every step, the squeak of deep cold resistance in each movement. The patterns.
In the first frigid temperature dips of October, it’s hard to believe that love is possible again before spring. But I fall hard for this world, still cocooned in pajamas beneath my layers.
When your face is hidden by scarf and hat and sunglasses, when your body is a rounded hint of humanoid, something is freed up that’s a bit different than happens in the weightless exposure of summer. I found myself alternately crawling, crouched, on all fours nose to the ice trying to capture what I saw for everyone who was inside, lamenting the cold.
It leaves those of us who are out on skis and snowshoes, fat bikes and boots, to our own curt kinship—a nod in passing because we have no faces to smile with, a “you ok?” to me as I sat trying to warm my phone enough to turn back on to take more photos for you.
I am ok, always, when I’m walking in this world.
