There is a sense of wilderness isolation here in our cove on this deep winter’s day. All of yesterday is lost beneath the snow that fell during the night. It has smoothed and gentled all the scars and blemishes of the cove, leaving an untouched world of purity and innocence.
There is no rutted road to travel, no trodden way for the eye to follow. The only sign of life is the blue smoke curling up from the chimney of a distant neighbor’s house where foot long tags of ice are hanging from the eaves.
Every crag is a gentle curve. Evergreens are freshly freighted from the skies. The boxwoods along the edge of the porch look like giant marshmallows. The pines on the hillsides are bowed under their white frosting.
There is a deep abiding silence, like the soul soothing quiet of a cathedral, broken now and then by sounds from afar that come clear and close. A dog barks into the frosty air on the ridge and talks to his kind in another cove. Song sparrows and cardinals chatter over weed seed uncovered.
Off beyond our little cove, with vast views of the Snowbird Mountains, is a world that clamors for attention. But here, on this deep winter’s day, is a simple world of snow and shadow and sound, a delight to the wearied eye, soothing to the ear. It stands isolated and wild, an island of solitude.
At first glance, it is a trackless haven. But a walk outside proves that even the wildness of snow has it tracks. Here and there are the tiny tracks of birds, the larger mincing tracks of squirrel. From under an old hemlock a series of solitary tracks, heavy on the forefeet, light on the rear, move in circles around about…a rabbit has made them.
The lake is laced with ice, the needle tatting of winter’s nimble fingers. The deep prints of our boots are the only human tracks in the white world of the cove’s mouth. The gleaming cloud of our breath is white and shimmering.
Broad purple pools of shadow lie in every hollow. A half hearted sun cuts a minor arc across the leaden sky and then is gone.
The dusk deepens and darkness comes on. We retrace our steps through the snow. The fire in the lodge is a bed of coals, but a couple sticks of wood and the flames dance again. Then it is mid-evening and the moonlight casts ink-black shadows on the snow.
And in our little cove, blanketed in white, there is a sense of wilderness isolation.