Winter in a New Hampshire Backyard

Featuring winter explorations and magic fish

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Music
Intro and outro: Chilled Acoustic Indie Folk by Lesfm
Stay at Home for Christmas by Lesfm
Winter Afternoon by 19745828
Winter Relax by Richard92
All music from Pixabay

Transcript

Hi. This is Ginger Johnson and you’re listening to Past Perfect: A Podcast. 

In some parts of the world, spring is just around the corner. Here in New Hampshire, it’s still a ways off, though it’s warmed up enough during the days to have tapped our maple trees. Today, I’m revisiting some winter-themed blog posts from ten to twelve years ago.

February 2, 2010

The snow gives way to the cold. The backyard which has been home to a sled run through the trees down to the pond, now has other allures.
 
The stream has frozen almost solid. Solid enough to walk on. Solid enough to skate on--if you have skates. If you don't have skates, a sturdy pair of boots does almost as well. Slipping and sliding, pretending to turn and spin, bypassing pine cones and leaves frozen to the surface.
 
The ice downstream of the springs is clear, glass-clear. So clear that she can see the water flowing underneath, see the detritus being pushed by invisible forces. Her son even saw a tadpole swimming under the ice a few days ago. How can that be? she wonders. It's six degrees out.
 
The ice upstream is cloudy, filled with tiny bubbles. Though it lacks the clarity of its cousin downstream, it is flat. Flat and perfect for sliding.
 
Back and forth they go, up and down, wary of the few areas where the ice is cracked and bubbled. Grabbing at trees to stay upright.
 
Pretending. Lost in the magic of an icy winter afternoon.

February 13, 2012

That summer day, the Gingerbread Man came home with a bag full of goldfish.
 
"For the pond," he said. Calling this water hole a pond is a bit generous. But there it is, surrounded by moss and ferns and springs, and you love it.
 
That summer you volunteered to take the compost out to the compost pile, just so you could head to the pond afterward. There was something magical about the sleek, orange bodies sliding in and out among the water plants, and the single frog who kept them company, hiding under fronds of ferns. You would hear the plop as he leaped into the water if you came too close.
 
By summer's end, only one fish remained. The others were surely victim to fisher cats or raccoons, or maybe even a fox. You named the sole fish Angst, and made a home for him in a goldfish bowl. His fishy antics kept you company all winter. You sat in the armchair on one side of the television, and he swished around in his bowl on the other side. Though you couldn't see him, you could hear little blips and flips, but each time you stood up to see what he was doing, he innocently swam in circles.
 
Must be the tides, you thought.
 
Made you look, he thought.
 
When spring rolled around again, you put Angst back in the spring-fed pond, where he was joined by a new crew, among them Goldeen, Blackie, and Cardinal. Once again, you made trips to the pond, to sit on the rock under the oak tree, and breathe in the green-ness of the place, watching for flashes of gold and orange in the water.
 
Time passed, the days grew shorter, and a chill settled over your neck of the woods. It was time to bring the fish in. Four hardy souls still swam in the wild waters. Your small fishbowl that housed Angst suddenly seems not only small, but cruel. The fish never made it inside that winter.
 
Come spring, you saw no happy flash of orange in the still waters, no sign of life at all. Had it been too cold? Did the fisher cats get them? The raccoons? You felt bad. Life is life, regardless of whether it is obtained by a 29-cent purchase at Wal-Mart or not. Visiting them had made you happy, on those days when you needed some sign of life other than the ten-and-under boy variety.
 
You did not buy any more fish, for your summer would be spent far, far away, and there would be no one to feed them, no one to seek out their magic. The pond remained empty that summer, but for the frogs.
 
Winter came yet again, and the fishbowl gathered dust and cobwebs on a shelf in the garage. Two floors above the fishbowl lay a sick gingerbread boy, a cranky gingerbread boy. Nearby was a mom, frustrated and housebound. At the end of that very long day spent inside, that mom longed for fresh air sucked into her dry lungs. She longed to stand under the comforting trees, and be a small thing, a part of the forest and the earth and the water.
 
That is you.
 
You grab a flashlight and follow the Gingerbread Man out to the compost pile.
 
"You mind if I go to the pond?" you ask.
 
He follows you as you crunch through the gritty snow. You don't need the flashlight, because the moon is full and bright, casting shadows on the blue snow. You pass by the rope swing, then go down the path veering to the right at the fork. There, two steps away, is the pond. Its surface is still and solemn, and you feel the frustration draining out of you, seeping out through your feet into the frozen ground. You feel calm just being here.
 
On a whim, you turn on the flashlight and aim it toward the middle of the pond.
 
You blink.
 
There, in the middle of the pond, is a goldfish, fins flickering.
 
He turns and dives back into his Atlantis.

February 21, 2010

The sap is running. The maples are tapped. Five gallons collected already.
 
They go outside to check the containers and find themselves pulled toward the stream, pulled by its frozen allure, pulled by sound of the trickle of water over and around the stones of the ford, pulled by the desire to smash the ice, even as they stand on it.
 
Snow covers the frozen stream; it is no longer smooth and skate-worthy. It's crunchy, and it echoes underneath in the space between the flowing water and the ice ceiling. But in most places, the ice is still several inches thick, so they walk along it anyway, occasionally stepping onto the banks of the stream where it has cracked, following the tracks of deer who smartly skip from the bank of one side to the safety on the other side.
 
They walk to the island, then they keep going--all the way to the marshy pond, where cattails rise up out of the ice like an army protecting its territory with seed head ammunition exploding into fluff.
 
She thinks the marshy pond would be better named the cemetery of trees, for it is populated by dead trees. The year they moved here, beavers dammed up the stream, flooded the marshy pond, and built a lodge. Evidence of strong teeth is everywhere. He points to one such tree, a foot and a half in diameter, gnawed down on one side by the industrious beavers.
 
"What were they thinking?" he asks. "How did they expect to move that?"
 
Optimism! she thinks.
 
While they examine beaver industry, young arms whack smaller trees with sticks. The spindly trees fall, which is even more satisfying than breaking up the ice on the stream.
 
One of the dead trees has been spray-painted with the word "BUTTER." The one next to it spells out "GOD." This reminds her of other graffiti in places she's been: "Make tea, not war." "17 1/2 minutes of Nixon buried here."
 
They wander through the cattails, through the dead trees, through the snow and ice. They hear a woodpecker clattering away in the distance. Spring approaches.
 
But for now, it is still cold.
 
And it is time to leave the cattail army, the graffiti-trees.
 
The sun shines down from its blue heaven, and for just a moment, all is right in her small world.

Wishing you some peaceful calm while you’re waiting for spring. Until next time, be well and let your light shine.