Winter’s Muse
- nwriversphotograph
- 4 minutes ago
- 3 min read
“The sky, tired of light, has given everything to the snow.”
Robert Walser
Sitting at home, dog at my feet and a warm fireplace to the side, I am thinking of winter. What happened this year in the Pacific Northwest? Is it gone? Did we miss it? It is early March and the days outside are warm and all of our trees are (and have been) budding.
Bellingham, being on the coast, doesn’t often see snow. But even in the mountains, over 5,000 feet, the snow base is only 163 inches. Plenty for good skiing but not near the mythical, deep snow reputation of Mt Baker (heavy snow is expected this week, so maybe that last minute Miracle March?). My place, at just over 700 feet, did get a light dusting this morning and last week, and it was beautiful, appreciated… but far too brief.
For those in the central states and along the east coast, this winter has been harsh with above average snowfall and COLD, the 53rd coldest winter to date since 1874). That is way different from the weather here in the Pacific Northwest.
Last month brought over 100 inches of snow to parts of the Sierra Mountains, but still California sits at just between 59% and 66% of normal snowpack. To really get hammered by snow … the deep, lose yourself in it, waist deep amounts of fluffy, immersive, and weightless snow (where my mind has taken me), you need to travel far this season. Japan for instance, where many areas are reporting over 23 feet of snow, or the Kamchatka Peninsula (a lifelong photography destination for brown bears, Steller's sea eagles and some 300 volcanoes) in far eastern Russia where the upcoming week is looking at 42 inches in what they are calling a “snow apocalypse”.
But that really doesn’t help much for me here in Bellingham, and I don’t like to give up easily. So to channel that ultimate source of creative inspiration, to summon that guiding spirit, that muse of winter, and the thus far missing frozen poetry of snow, I need to travel back in time to earlier and epic trips where winter was really winter. We are talking cold explorations to Haines, the Grand Tetons, and Yellowstone (this past December recorded 27 degrees below zero at Old Faithful). I was not there, and while it might sound appealing for someone who likes the cold, and Yellowstone … I’ll pass and be content to write this posting, and drink a hot coffee, from my cozy home!).
This is when writing is hard! I want to reflect one final time on winter’s beauty, stillness, and bracing cold. But everything outside my window cries new life and approaching spring. I want to evoke days sitting on the mountain, goggles just peeking out of the snowbank, but I am watching the deer molt out of their winter coats in the backyard. In my mind, I envision bears, eagles, and the snowy banks of the Chilkat River in early November. But when I open my eyes, there are just bunnies eating the first dandelions of the year!
This is the beauty of photography. It allows me (and hopefully each of you) to not only relive memories of winter’s beauty, but to actually have an emotional, sensory, and cognitive recollection of cold, snow and ice experiences. Sitting here, I can actually see and feel the snow falling along the river, the bracing winter wind and cold, eagles just out of view and eventually lost in the storm, the excitement when that late-season grizzly emerged downstream.
I can’t (and would not want) to ignore the motivation provided by the coming new spring season, with its longer days and warmer weather. But for just one more day, I will enjoy and appreciate the peaceful, reflective atmosphere of snowy days. One last day of writing about the winter season and a final day of quiet reflection.
Excuse me while I throw another illusory log on my fireplace!
The first fall of snow is not only an event, it is a magical event. You go to bed in one kind of a world and wake up in another quite different, and if this is not enchantment then where is it to be found?
J. B. Priestley
