We have been blessed with lots of snow this winter lending a bit of magic to what could have been a rather cold and leaden December. Walking up the staircase at night, cup of hot chocolate in hand, I pause at the windows and can see clearly across the field and beyond. Even when the moon is less than full the snow seems to glow as if a light bulb has been buried beneath it’s billowy drifts.
Deer have taken up residence in the alfalfa field just beyond the lawns edge. Some move ghostlike through the field pawing up tender shoots for grazing. Others bunker down in beds on the driveway, nestled up against the snow banks which provide protection from the winter winds.
At 4AM I descend the staircase, empty mug in hand. The snows luminescence glows through the windows high on the wall above my head. I pause again at the window, and then the next window and the next, until I have made my way to the kitchen. Often, the deer are right where I left them the night before. Other times I circle the house window by window only to be disappointed.
Eventually I turn on the kitchen light. It’s bulb glares at me, dispelling the magic I was feeling just a moment earlier. In a few minutes hot coffee and my morning commute will replace those moments of solitude and wonder with the sharp jangle of the other world that lurks beyond my windows.
Filed under: Simple Life
