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New Year’s Day—Not in Texas Anymore

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As I awoke on this New Year’s Day, it was very apparent that we weren’t in Texas anymore!  The temperature was six degrees below zero, and snow, beautiful snow, covered the ground with a nice, thick blanket!  We had been gone for seventeen days visiting family and friends in Kansas City and Austin.  Seventeen days of real social time—no digital social media needed or wanted.  You know, just like the ‘old days.’

In the upcoming weeks, I will write about some of our outdoor adventures in the warmth of Kansas and Texas—so many amazing things to see, even in winter!  Until then, I want to wish you beautiful mornings and beginnings…

…abundance in all areas of your lives…

…and time with friends and loved ones around the campfire, around the dinner table, and out in Nature!  Happy New Year!

Fair Warnings and Feeding Frenzies

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One semester before returning to graduate school, I worked as a teacher’s aide at our neighborhood elementary school.  It was a traditional, old-style, brick schoolhouse with two stories, wide stairways, and big windows.  I stayed with one student who needed some extra help with staying on task and controlling his behavior.  I was prepared for my work with him and with a whole school of exuberant young children, except for one thing—I wasn’t warned about lunch time!  Lunch was held in a big gym that was built to one side of the school—lunch tables were lined up under basketball hoops, and a long line formed around the walls of the gym as we waited to get our lunches.  In the winter, heavy coats, hats, and mittens were thrown down in haste along the wall in anticipation of recess.  Excited anticipation in young children is not conducive to savoring a nutritious, delicious lunch, and on that first day and every day thereafter, I could not believe how fast the food was gotten, gulped, and trashed as a necessary precursor to what they really wanted—recess!

Mother Nature gives fair warnings.  Sometimes she does so in colorful and dramatic ways: sunrises like this mean that some kind of weather event is literally ‘on the horizon.’  The beauty of the colors are not just visual art to be noticed and appreciated; it means something.  When I looked at the western horizon, the sky was dark with heavy, snow-filled clouds.

I wasn’t the only one to notice—the birds knew, too.  Every morning usually has a ‘feeding time’ for the birds, but before the snow came, there was a feeding frenzy!  More birds, more movement, more excitement.  Purple Finches flocked to the feeders and to the ground beneath them, gulping down black oil sunflower seeds.

Gray-cloaked Juncos hopped around on the grass and snow, gathering seeds and gathering friends.

At the back feeder, the beautiful, brassy Blue Jays shoveled through discarded shells in search of intact seeds as the snow began to fall.  An old tin tub holds acorns and corn cobs—another cafeteria for the birds and squirrels.

 

Fair warning in a vibrant sunrise and fair warning in a Black Friday National Climate Assessment that was released and refuted by the White House.  Climate scientists anticipate what is going to happen based on science, data, and expertise.  The latest report confirmed what climate scientists have been seeing and reporting for decades—the rise in greenhouse gases is hurting the economy, the environment, and public health.  Get ready, be prepared, make changes—yet another fair warning—this one intense and wide-reaching.  The questions of whether the right models were used, whether scientists were profiting from this, and if this was for political reasons are moot points.  All we need to do is look at what Mother Nature is saying—the warnings are consistent and persistent—record rains, flooding, wildfires, droughts, high temperatures, extreme fluctuations, and ice melts.  The evidence is right before our eyes.  The real question is why aren’t some of us noticing it, seeing it, believing it, anticipating it?  Just like any other form of denial: the ‘cost’ of seeing the truth is more painful than the ‘cost’ of believing our own story.  How do we not throw away what truly sustains us just to quickly get what we want?

The Colors of November

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Nature always wears the colors of the spirit.  –Ralph Waldo Emerson

The leaves are gone.  Snow covers the ground this morning—plow-able, shovel-able snow.  We’ve had single digit low temperatures.  The skies have been cloudy with a touch of sun.  Our ‘getting-ready-for-winter work’ is not quite finished.  And this is not depressing news!  The trees have entered their dormancy, their hibernation of sorts.  Most of the action is below ground now.  Let them have their rest.  The ‘flurries’ and ‘dustings’ have added up to more snow than we expected, but I have to say, looking out the window as my feet hit the floor in the morning and seeing a blanket of snow makes me smile.  We will trade these cold temps for some forties later this week, which will give us time to finish our ‘getting-ready-for-winter work.’  The gray of November is not really so gray—I found a palette of color around the yard this week!

How wonderful yellow is.  It stands for the sun.  –Vincent Van Gogh, artist

You are my sunshine!  This is the time of year that Common Witch Hazel blooms!  Isn’t that amazing?!

There are many languages that don’t make a distinction between green and blue and treat these as shades of one color.   –Guy Deutscher, linguist

Orange is the happiest color.   –Frank Sinatra, singer

The more basic the color, the more inward, the more pure.  –Piet Mondrian, artist

Red is the ultimate cure for sadness.  –Bill Blass, fashion designer

Green is the prime color of the world, and that from which its loveliness arises.  –Pedro Calderon de la Barca, playwright

Blue color is everlastingly appointed by the deity to be a source of delight.  –John Ruskin, artist and art critic

 

We in the North are entering our ‘hibernation’ time, so to speak, when most of the action takes place indoors.  It can be a time of rest and renewal after a fervent and busy Spring, Summer, and Fall.  Let yourself rest.  During this rest time, there can also be an unexpected blossoming of inner work and creativity.  What is your happiest color?  Paint it!  Wear it!  What is your ultimate cure for sadness?  Write about it!  What makes you smile in the Winter time?  Share that with someone!  We are all shades of one color, the spirit of the Earth given to us by the true Spirit.  Everlastingly.

April Fooled

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When I was younger, in those early thirties days when one begins to come out of the rather clueless, self-involved but necessary decade of fun and invincibility, I began to learn about myself.  I remember reading a book that described the actions and reasons for what the experts now call co-dependency.  I remember being excited to learn this information that made sense of my feelings and interactions with other people!  I immediately shared the good news with my best friend, ready to re-make our relationship into a better functioning, more equitable friendship.  I was fooled into thinking that information easily translates to action, that this change would be easy, that we both would want this to happen.  Instead, it was the beginning of the end of our long and lovely friendship—the very thing co-dependents dread the most.  And I was slammed with loss and devastation.

Since Spring officially arrived on the calendar, we have been fooled into thinking Winter was easily going to pass the baton to Spring.  Instead we have had single digit temperatures more like January and more snow than we have seen the whole rest of Winter.  After our post-Easter snow and the one after that, we warmed up this week and made progress towards Spring—at least in the first step of getting rid of the snow.  The deliberate, clipped tracks of a fox melted into a ground-baring trail that disappeared into brown grass.  Progress.

By Friday morning, the yard was more grass than snow.  Progress!

A flock of Juncos descended on the remains of sunflower seeds.  Were they fooled into heading North for their Spring mating and Summer living?

The weekend forecast was already warning us of another big snowstorm, bringing dreadful resignation that Mother Nature is in charge, no matter how badly we want Spring.  The early morning sky dawned red with warning.  The barometric pressure fell, inducing discomfort in joints and heads.  There was uneasiness in the air.

By afternoon, snow and sleet slammed into the house from the north northeast.  “Ha!  Fooled you!  Don’t even think about Spring,” roared Mother Nature.  Spring took two steps back towards Winter.

Wind howled through the night and through the next day, crescendoing in gusts to 64 mph.  What we believed about Spring was being challenged with might and resistance from the old, clingy, egoistic ways of Old Man Winter.

Sunday morning the wind was still blowing and the snow was still snowing.  The sidewalk I had shoveled yesterday was completely covered with a drift even bigger than the one before.  Snowflakes flung by the wind stung my face as I walked the dog in my full winter gear.

What to do?  Shovel the walk again.  Wait until the snow stops.  Shovel again.  Repeat if necessary. 

 

We have been April fooled.  We are starting our fourth week of Spring.  Snow should be gone.  Daffodils are usually blooming by this time.  Ice is usually off the lakes.  None of those things.  Instead we’ve had a three-day blizzard as we sit indoors eating humble pie.  I wish I could profess I was never fooled again after those painful early thirties, but the truth is I continued to be fooled by people, situations, and myself.  Most of us tend to take situations and people on good faith, with good intention, with hope and the benefit of the doubt, and that can lay the groundwork for the capacity for things to go wrong.  The good news is we keep learning about ourselves, and we make progress.  We take two steps forward, then one step back.  Sometimes we are flung back many steps by challenges from our old, clingy, egoistic selves and way of life.  Change is hard, and change is not linear.  Sometimes we drop the baton—again and again.  At times we wait for the snow to stop snowing and the wind to stop blowing, and then we try again.  So let’s lift our shovels to Progress!  Spring actually is on its way!  

Snow and Wildflowers

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“Aren’t you tired of taking pictures of snow?” asked my daughter Emily with a sigh, after I updated her with the snow and cold report from Central Minnesota.  While we were basking in sunshine and snow for Easter, she and Shawn were hiking through wildflowers in 70 degree temperatures in Texas.  “It is as it is,” I answered—even though it’s April, even though we had eight more inches of snow on Monday and Tuesday, even though we had single digit temps for three nights in a row this week.  “Besides, it’s pretty!” I exclaimed in true Minnesota form.

Texas Bluebonnets by Em Brake

Tuesday morning I woke up, rolled over, and looked out the window at the old Oak tree that was the subject of my first blog post four years ago.  257 blog posts and thousands of photographs later, I’m still not tired of taking pictures and writing about Nature in all her beauty and wisdom, snow or no snow.

The warm sunshine started to melt snow off the roof, and a marimba of icicles formed on the overhang.  

The only track through the fresh eight inches of snow on Wednesday morning was the Tamba trail made from her treks to the woods during the two days of snow.

Prickly Pear Cactus by Em Brake

On Thursday morning as the sun rose, a frosty mist rose from the ground, enveloping the trees.  Instantly, at two degrees F, frost built up on the branches right before my eyes!  It was a spectacular phenomenon!  Then, as the power of the sun burned through the mist, the frost fell from the trees.

Rose Prickly Poppy by Em Brake

Minnesota in early April versus Texas in early April.  1200 miles between us.  Both places have a plant that represents Hope at this time of year.  In Minnesota, the early-blooming Pussy Willow lets us know that Spring is on its way, in spite of the surrounding snow.

In Texas, where periods of drought are common, Hope is embodied in the Rain Lily.  It appears a few days after heavy rains in the eastern two-thirds of Texas, as if by magic.  The blossoms open slowly at dusk and through the night and are in full bloom by morning.

Rain Lily by Em Brake

 

‘It is as it is’ has no reference to the past.  Four years ago we had temperatures close to sixty degrees here in Minnesota.  It also has no reference to the future—the snow will melt in the next couple of weeks when we reach the forties and fifties and get ‘back to normal.’  ‘It is as it is’ embraces the present moment, the present day—whether windchills or wildflowers.  Mother Nature has one over on us—she is in control of the weather.  But ‘it is as it is’ does not imply that the choices, actions, and occurrences of the past has had no influence on the present situation or climate, and it certainly doesn’t indicate what will happen in the future.  The past lays the groundwork for the present.  The future is like a clean, fresh palette of snow—where will the tracks and trails go?  What kind of magic will appear?  What will bloom in the midst of struggles?  How can each of us imbue Hope in this world?

Come September, I will be asking Emily how she can stand another day of heat in the 100’s, and I expect she will answer, “It is as it is, Mom.”   

Holy Week is the Story of Our Lives

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This has been a wild week—a wild and holy week.  Wild because of the weather, with up and down temperatures, sunshine and snow, mud and ice.  Holy because it’s Holy week in the Christian religion.  Palm Sunday dawned with a peaceful, pastel sky—a sight to behold, one fit for a King.

Early Spring eases its way out of Winter with fits and starts—the promise is here, small signs are here, but in good standing, we cannot proclaim that Spring is here.  One morning, this small sign of Spring chirped and sang with exuberance from on high in the Linden tree.  A Starling is not known to be a pretty or interesting bird, but he was singing hosanna with joy!

The colorful Sunday morning sky heralded in a Monday morning snow.  Confusion swirled around the Spruce branches as the vine tried to reassure them.  Spring is here!  They did not believe. 

Tuesday warmed to 40 degrees with brilliant sunshine, and the sap was lifted up from the earth and flowed from a wound in the Maple tree.  Now this feels like Spring!

Wednesday was muddy and messy.  The warmth melted the new snow and chiseled away at the old piles.  Plans for the future garden were held in disbelief.

It’s too hard to imagine Spring and new life when the snow still clings to the north-facing hills.

Thursday’s rising sun shone through another colorful morning sky, foreshadowing another stormy day.  The pink light from the east reflected off the western hills.  Geese flew to the open part of the Sauk River for nourishment and companionship, washing their feet in the clear, cold water.

Friday morning’s sky was heavy and dark to the west, and I thought to myself, ‘It looks like snow.’  Soon the flakes started to fall, laying down an inch or so on the pavement as the warmed earth melted it away.  A Pileated Woodpecker crowed his distinctive call, flew to the base of one of the old Spruce trees, and proceeded to excavate a cavernous hole with his powerful beak.  He shouldn’t be destroying a live, formidable tree.

The afternoon looked normal, looked warm, but the wind picked up and felt damp and cold, betraying any thoughts of Spring.  When the sun sank and the day was done, the night sky was a strange purple-gray.

I heard the wind straining the house and trees overnight and heard ice hitting the windows.  A Winter chill settled over the house, over the land, over the Spring.  Saturday morning was cold with a wind chill of 1° F and three inches of snow.  The evergreen tree branches drooped with the burden of heavy, icy snow.  The blue sky taunted us to come outside to play, but everything else about the day held grief, disbelief, and suffering.  Spring, why have you forsaken us?

Easter morning dawned clear and cold.  The wind had calmed down.  The second blue moon of the year was setting in the west.

The sun rose blindingly bright; we were unable to look directly at its glory—even through the trees its power was undeniable.  The Cardinals were singing their Spring songs, and the sun created infinite sparkling diamonds in the snow.

 

It seems like all of Life is encompassed in Holy week.  Our exuberant joys and our deepest sorrows.  The days our hearts are troubled.  Our denial and disbelief in what is real, in what is happening before our eyes, in what we thought we strongly held in our hearts.  Holy week and our lives are wild with confusion, doubt, and suffering, along with devotion, love, and friendship.  It highlights the tender, vulnerable moments of our lives when we dare to kneel in servanthood, when we break the rules for justice and kindness, when we offer our dearest ones to another for safe-keeping, and when we call out to God in prayer.  It reveals the inconsistency and idiocy of power in the wrong hands and of deluded group-think that spreads like wildfire and destroys the Spirit of truth.  It gives us hope for the future, peace for the present, and reclamation for the past.  It gives us a way forward, a blueprint for transformation, and a belief in a bigger, more benevolent Way.  Holy Week is the story of our lives.  Peace and Love be with you.

A Slow Slide and Adversity

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“If we had no winter, the spring would not be so pleasant; if we did not sometimes taste adversity, prosperity would not be so welcome.”   –Anne Bradstreet

I knew my third pregnancy would be my last, and I was intentional in being present and grateful for the miracle of growing and carrying a new human being.  I really liked being pregnant and had had easy pregnancies before.  That was about to change!  Morning sickness was my constant companion for most of the way through two trimesters, and I spent more than my share of time on the couch and in the bathroom.  Saltine crackers were my friends, and the smell of tuna and the act of brushing my teeth were my enemies.  Yet every day, I was grateful.  As my abdomen grew large, time was slow and sweet as I welcomed each and every thing with my newest babe.

We have had a cold winter—not as snowy as most, but very cold.  Spring officially arrives on Tuesday, and I find myself being present and grateful for the chilly, icy mornings along with the sunny, above-freezing days.  I am not wishing Winter away.  The snow melt reveals the winter’s pile of sunflower seed shells under the bird feeder where every kind of creature, bird and mammal alike, have rummaged for the high-fat black oil seeds that slipped through the cracks.

The snow melts in the strong sunshine during the day and hardens into crusty, compacted crystals during the freezing nights.  The power of the sun is evident after a winter of low-in-the-sky traveling—snowbanks recede even when the temperature is below freezing.

Lavender is still stuck in the snow; leaves and sticks in the yard absorb the warmth and melt the ice and snow around them.

The wonder of Spring is beginning to reveal itself with Birch and Hazelnut catkins and swollen Maple tree buds.

Melted snow pooled into a small stream-bed of rocks—liquid by day, ice by night.

Geese, Trumpeter Swans, and even some Sandhill Cranes have taken flight through the blue skies, announcing their presence with their distinctive songs.

The pair of pairs of Eagles are at their nests—time will reveal whether each have viable eggs.  The oldest pair was not brooding on the nest, but one was sitting on a branch when we came by.  One of the younger Eagles at the other nest was keeping eggs warm.

Saturday’s surprise was the spotting of two Robins!  Iconic signs of Spring.  I wonder if they were confused by the snow still in the yard!

 

I like how we slide slowly out of Winter into Spring.  Longer days and melting snow remind us how far from the Winter Solstice we are—we’ve made it through another season of cold and snow!  While the dormancy of Winter is important for gathering nutrients and resting the system, it also makes Spring and Summer that much sweeter!  The mindful morning sickness I felt in my last pregnancy was, in essence, getting me ready for the adversity and long recovery after the birth.  What does adversity reveal to us?  It reveals our strengths and endurance.  It shows our weaknesses, and the places we are stuck.  It magnifies the cracks in the system that we’ve slipped through.  Adversity allows us to learn our own distinctive song of ourselves and how to sing it.  It teaches us to absorb the warmth and power of Love that melts away the obstacles that have been holding us back.  Because of this, I do not wish Winter or adversity away anymore, but I sure do welcome Spring and the good fortune that lay on the other side.

Dodging Cars and Bullets

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Have you ever woken in the morning and even before you open your eyes or move from your last position of sleep you feel weight pressing in on your mind and body?  That’s how I woke on Friday.  Sometimes it’s a low barometric pressure squeezing in on me; sometimes it’s from the energy-draining not-enough-sleep for a couple of nights; other times it’s a worry, a fight, or an anniversary of something only your body remembers that your mind does not want to recall.  It’s when you drag your body out of bed and hope that breakfast and caffeine will boost your energy and dissipate the pressure.

Do animals ever feel that way?  How do deer wake and show up for their day?  They sleep in the snow and cold, have to forage for their daily food, and at times have to dodge cars and bullets.  Sounds like a recipe for having a horrible, no good, very bad day.  But I don’t think they do.

I think I could turn and live with animals, they are so placid and self-contain’d.  I stand and look at them long and long.  They do not sweat and whine about their condition.  They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins.  They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God.  Not one is dissatisfied, not one is demented with the mania of owning things.  Not one kneels to another, nor to his kind that lived thousands of years ago.  Not one is respectable or unhappy over the whole earth.  –excerpt from Song of Myself by Walt Whitman

When I was young, I thought animals were easier to understand than humans, so I wanted to be a veterinarian.  I loved this poem by Walt Whitman, even in its irreverent way.  I argued with Walt’s line that ‘not one is respectable,’ for I had great respect for animals, especially my horses.  Before we were married, Chris made me a present of a framed picture of this poem in calligraphy with a drawing of a horse.  I recite the first lines often in my head when I feel the pressure of living in our human world.   

Chris, in his wisdom of knowing me for thirty-eight years, suggested on Friday that we go to the pine forest in the snow, to where the animals live, to where I could get out of my head and out of my funk, to where the old pines whisper their secrets.  I begrudgingly agreed, even as my body wanted to just splay itself on the floor with a blanket.  So in the late afternoon, we drove the short distance to Warner Lake County Park to bathe in the solitude of the pine forest.

The little creek that runs into the lake wasn’t frozen, and the trail had been ‘groomed’ for cross-country skiing.

Walking was relatively easy on the groomed trail (not on the ski tracks, of course), but hard work in the short areas where we blazed a trail.  Energy returned to my body as we ventured deeper into the woods.

The forest was a constellation of light and shadow, with outlines and crowns of snow.

The late day sun cast long shadows of the long trees.  Animal tracks cut across the trails—their footprints leaving the history of their day.

In a small clearing, we saw a shining young pine, enveloped and radiant in the Winter sunshine, as the old, wise guardians surrounded it.

It was peaceful and quiet in the snowy forest—a silky balm for my out-of-sorts mind and body.  I was a welcome visitor in the animals’ house, with no host needed.  They were willing to share their majestic home with seekers of beauty and peace.

 

Our lives are a constellation of light and shadow.  Some days we live in the darkness, and often we don’t even know what is casting the shadow.  It feels like we are dodging the flu, or the axe, or the bullet.  The recipe is written, and it seems to spell disaster.  But what if the recipe for your day is written in pencil?  What if sitting in prayer or meditation erases worry?  What if ten minutes of exercise erases pain?  And talking to your friend takes away the blues?  We are each a shining star, like the radiant young pine tree in the forest.  Dissatisfaction melts away to gratitude.  The mania of owning things morphs into a willingness to share.  Anxiety and worry transform into placid self-containment.  The whispered secrets of the ancient guardians begin to work their way into the tracks of our days.  And we live like the animals and are happy.

Snow, Ice, and Water–These Three are One

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“Water, in all its forms, is what carries the knowledge of life throughout the universe.”     –Anthony T. Hincks

When a person lives where water is always liquid and falling as rain or flowing like a river, I think there is a tendency to not think about it much, to perhaps take it for granted.  But when something is ‘too much’ or ‘not enough’—flooding or drought—or something unusual or rare—snow in Texas—we tend to pay attention.  We haven’t had much snow here in Central Minnesota for most of this winter—until the week before last, that is, when we had over a foot of it.  I looked out the front door at the big pile of white stuff and thought, “Isn’t snow funny and amazing and beautiful?”  I mean, it’s just water, frozen water!  Beautiful crystals of frozen water falling from the sky!  Frozen water that is shoveled and piled, rolled and patted into balls to form snowmen and forts by kids at recess.  Amazing!

  “There is a beauty about winter that no other season can touch.”  –Hailey DeRoo Haugen

“Kindness is like snow—It beautifies everything it covers.”  –Kahlil Gibran

Another beautiful frozen water phenomenon is frost—frozen water vapor on the surface of objects.

Sun-warmed and melted snow dripped and re-froze into icicles—Mother Nature’s decorating of the evergreen Spruce trees.

“Snow is water, and ice is water, and water is water; these three are one.”  –Joseph Dare

And then there’s ice.  Ice that’s strong enough to drive a truck on.  Ice that captures and immobilizes tree branches, leaves, aquatic plants and roots.  Ice that holds a village of ice shacks and fishermen.

“The water hears and understands.  The ice does not forgive.”  –Leigh Bardugo

Ice as art.  Ice as frozen Rorschach tests.  What do you see?

“You’re gonna catch a cold from the ice inside your soul.”  –Christina Perri

 

If water, in all its forms, carries the knowledge of life, we have a lot to learn in Winter.  I respect the idea that winter, in all its starkness, can radiate a beauty like no other.  I love the idea of beautifying the world with kindness.  I like how water and situations and people can be transformed, change states, be honed in the process of warming, melting, and re-freezing to flowing, understanding, and forgiving.  Goodness and Grace can thaw an icy soul.  I also honor the toughness of ice, how it builds up inch by inch during the harshness of Winter’s cold in order to support the things we drive and those that drive us.  How it supports a village of people who want the same basic things in life, in spite of how the harshness can capture and immobilize us at times.  I appreciate that frozen water (oh, the chemistry and physics of it all!) is art.  How we can stare into the depths of it or notice the light or marvel at the structure, and at the same time, learn something about ourselves.  There is a great deal of hope in every snowflake that falls, in every frost pattern that forms, in every layer of ice that is laid down, and in every process of melting.  Life is funny, amazing, and beautiful—all three in one.

Wrath of the Northwest Wind

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We decided it was time for some Winter hiking.  Beautiful blue skies accompanied the single digit high-for-the-day temperature.  We drove to a small state park west of us that we had never been to, traveling by snow-covered fields and signs for rural Lutheran churches.  The roads leading up to the entrance and throughout Monson Lake State Park weren’t plowed, so we guessed on the parking at the office building where I found an outside box with maps of the park.  We were the only ones there.  Next to the office building was an historic site sign, and as we read it, we both had a dark, sinking feeling, like watching horrid news on TV that you should turn off but you keep watching.  On this site on August 20, 1862, thirteen Swedish settlers living on the edge of the frontier were killed by native Dakota Indians who had been displaced from their traditional homelands, placed on reservations, and who endured broken treaties and increasing hunger and hardships.  The park was established in 1923 as a memorial to the Broberg and Lundborg families who lost their lives on that day.  Usch då.  

In the late 1930’s, two buildings were constructed in the new park by the Veterans’ Conservation Corps—a picnic pavilion and cooking area and a restroom—using local granite and white oak timbers. 

After a stop at the very cold outhouse, we walked the one-mile hiking trail.  In the middle of a frozen slough we saw a muskrat house and followed the tracks that led to it.  The new snow was fine and powdery and had blown into the prints, so it was hard to tell who made them.

But as we got closer, we realized the trekking critter was also just checking out the house and moving on.

A wind-made sundial was etched into the snow beside the muskrat house, marking the Winter sun’s path to the Spring Equinox. 

From the center of the ice- and snow-covered slough we looked back on the Oaks and Basswoods that lined the hiking trail.

We hiked along West Sunburg Lake where the wind had made stripes of snow and ice.  The sun was warm on our faces.

We saw what looked like coyote tracks on a food-finding mission at the edge of the lake.

After making a hairpin turn in the trail on the narrow isthmus between two lakes, we faced Monson Lake and the wrath of a northwest wind.

The trail was covered in drifts, and Ironwood understory trees, with their rusty leaves, chattered in the wind.  The frigid, relentless wind pulled tears from my eyes, hurt my cheeks, and froze my breath.  It felt like we were at a different place on a different day.

We hurried back to the picnic area that was sheltered from the wind and where once again, the sun warmed us.  We saw little vole tracks under the snow…

…and coneflower shadows stretching in the low-slung midday sun.

We celebrated the old beauty Bur Oak tree that spread across the blue sky.

As one of Minnesota’s smallest state parks, it is largely unchanged since its establishment.  It is easy to see why it was a desirable location for the Dakota people for millennia and for the Swedish immigrants over 150 years ago.  On the edge of the park in a small rectangle of land carved out from the park border is a little white Lutheran church and cemetery.  Some of the graves date back to the late 1800’s, and the words are engraved in Swedish. 

 

The wrath of the northwest wind coming off Monson Lake tells the story of pain and suffering of Native and Immigrant people.  History is buried under the soil, under the water, and under the snow.  I like that the little Lutheran church sits so close to the memorial park where the homes of the Dakotas and settlers once stood.  I like how prayers are said every Sunday morning at 9:30 with coffee and fellowship following the service.  I like how the Swedish words are etched in stone.  I like how the cross and steeple track the Winter sun’s path year after year, decade after decade, stretching Grace and Spring’s Hope out to all who enter these gates.  Life is hard.  May you walk in Peace, may you celebrate Beauty, and may Love warm your face and heart.  Gud välsigne dig.