A Prosody of Snowshoeing

I went snowshoeing the other day. The gray sky stretched above me, dense with the promise of heavy snow.

The world was a cold shadow even though it was afternoon. Playful snowflakes chased each other among the branches of birch, fir, oak.

I had no reason to hurry but broke away from the car with a fervor, unexpected. Crunch-crunch-crunch. You cannot be stealthy on snowshoes as they break through a crisp, frozen landscape.

Even in the fluffiest snowfall, the back of my snowshoes taps up with each step, ensuring a rhythmic click-click-click as I go. A moment, I pause, listen to the wind. A dog barks in the distance but no other voices or click-clicks pierce the wintery quiet.

Last week, we met a man on a fat bike, tires grooved with wide rivets and thick spikes like cleats. He had arm gloves extending from his handlebars past his elbows. “Lovely day!” “Beautiful!” We called out to each other. The sun shone through the branches to the white earth, except on the narrowest paths winding through the trees, where shadows turned the ground gray.

Today, alone, during my pause, listening, I am struck with a sudden thought: why am I running? Realistically, I wasn’t running. I am not so skilled on my snowshoes for that effort. But today, as soon as I left the car, I barreled down the trail, deep into the woods.

What’s the rush? I had no reason other than this: my body said GO, GO, GO! The cold air invigorates me, snow on my boots, on my face, glasses fogging up in the wind. I notice a new smudge on the upper right lens of my glasses, fogging up with my breath while I let myself sink into my surroundings.

I look at my watch through my left lens. I have been charging through the woods like a New Yorker chasing the subway for twenty minutes.

I laugh at myself, aloud, sound filling the air. I haven’t been a rushed New Yorker in about five years. Relax, let it be. I check my hat – yes, still tied securely to my bag. It’s warmer today, almost 30 degrees Fahrenheit. I move my neck wrap up to my head to cover my ears, the only part of me that’s cold. I reorient myself, scan the landscape between the trees on all sides of the path.

In the distance, the big fir trees create dark shadows, ominous at first glance but then welcoming. I can’t see through them to beyond, to the distance, to a horizon, and the possibility of exploration tempts me, but the call of the path is, wisely, thankfully, stronger.

I start again. Isn’t that the great secret of life? No matter where we are, we can begin again. Measured steps now. I look around as I go. I use my poles so I don’t have to check my footing. Eyes up, right, left, center. I take the view in like air, as much as I can through my glasses, peering through the clearest part of each lens.

Around a wide bend, the trunks off to the right are bare, almost orange in their light-brown-ness; they remind me of wheat. In the distance now, I see further into an unknown brightness, white on the ground, trees like stalks disappear into the horizon.

Up a hill, the path broadens, downed limbs and branches sprinkled across the forest floor to my left. Their density fades, trees and branches cluster together, create tunnels of darkness.

To the right, a fully fallen tree, roots wide in a circle knit together with dirt and dead grass to form a tapestry, vertical, the diameter more than twice my height.

Just beyond, a birch arches across the forest, its stump firmly in the ground but the trunk reaches up, up, up and then over, over, above smaller trees, then back down until its branches sink into a pile of other branches, trees, snow, then sinking into the forest floor.

I stop again, listen to my breath, check my bearings. I know where I am. The downed tree and arching birch like old friends. I let my listening branch out like a vine, my body the trunk, as if in my stillness I am just another tree in the woods. I wonder if there are forest messages for me, or if, with enough silence, I can find those deep, quiet thoughts, those whispers I can only hear far outside the business of life.

Sometimes as I go along, I replay images from a book I’m reading or snippets of conversations. Sometimes my mind stumbles through worries and hopes unspoken. I let them turn over on their own, let them come and go. Today I am thinking about a book, about my mom, about myself, about grief and goals. It all mingles together like snowflakes falling or tangled roots, or branches from different trees that weave together to make a roof above narrow sections of trail.

Another hill and I ascend, notice the shadows changing, deepening. There is new thickness, urgency to the snowfall now. In the distance off to the right somewhere a dog barks again, now a child shouts.

I want to more fully draw out the map of these trails in my mind. I focus, let my mind’s compass retrace where I’ve been, where I think this path should go. “True north” is the parking lot, although it’s east of where I am now.

I remember my first time in snowshoes last year. How loud the click-clicks seemed against my breath, panting, my body unused to this form of winter exertion. Snowpant legs brushing against each other, poles sticking into the snow against each loudly crunching each step. A weird sort of hemiola, a mismatched syncopation. The prosody of snowshoeing in winter.

Today the sounds seem to work in consort. I imagine the rhythmic structure shifting when I go uphill, when I bounce joyfully down. I’m wearing shell pants today and although they are louder than snowpants, I barely notice them. My steps and breath coordinate easily at a steadier pace.

I notice animal tracks, wish I could read them. All different sizes just off the trail, across the trail, into the distance. On the trail, they mingle with the lines from cross-country skis and the footprints of snowshoes larger than mine. Some tracks go right up to large trees, then stop. I know there are deer, foxes here, squirrels and chipmunks, all manner of birds. The largest birds are my favorites. I love to watch them soar overhead in the summer.

I lean comfortably into my poles, take stock, then step again and again. Up the next hill I see a smaller trail off to the left. The path I’m on goes straight to the car; I know this way. I reorient the map in my mind, choose the narrow opening to the left, notice the flurries around me picking up again. The quiet somehow seems even more quiet as I go, hushed, shhh. The crunch-click crunch-click of my snowshoes feels rude.

This path winds parallel to the path I was on, then turns sharply left, down a hill, over a bridge. I see the snowshoe tracks ahead of me, notice the light changing. Turn to the left again. Pause. Should I go back? This can’t go too much farther before it intersects with something familiar, right? I don’t have a light besides my phone but it’s still afternoon.

Go, go! My curiosity is strong. I look to my right, see more trees, thick trunks. Somewhere over there is my car in the small lot. But I won’t leave the trail. I’ll trust. I have what I need to find my way. I’m not really in the wilderness; these trails are groomed and well-traveled.

Down the hill, then flattening out, then down again. I wind to the right and then back to the left. The narrow path means I’m closer to the trees on either side, the branches above me lean in, mingle with each other, block out the sky. It’s maybe too dark to read comfortably without a light, but not really dark, not like “dark dark,” as I might say to a friend. I can see the trail, the trees, just fine.

Down a bit more and then an intersection with a wide, main trail. My instinct says go left, complete the circle, and in a few minutes I recognize my surroundings. Up the next big hill is where I chose the narrow path to the left, just past it I can stay to loop around to the car. A new part of the trail system is etched in my mind; I’ll confirm it with the map my watch makes later.

I make my way up with renewed vigor, realize I am grinning. I am elated, exuberant. I am above myself, in a sense. Above my self. I feel a sense of one-ness. I am the snow and the trees and the falling flakes that trust their way to the earth.

I reach the break in the woods, see the building near the parking lot, notice where different trails fade into the trees. Snow falls, falls, falls all around. The gray sky stretches wide above the treetops and the snow on the fields looks brighter against it, radiant, a glowing smile defiant against the looming dark.

I am grateful, grateful.

I feel again – but somehow for the first time, in that way that coming back to yourself is always a new beginning: I feel like me.

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Dear Readers:

This is the first in a series I plan to fill out in whatever time it chooses or takes. Loosely following the narrative of the Major Arcana in Tarot, this post is my wintery bloggy “how I feel about it today” interpretation of The Fool, card 0, a card of new beginnings, of starting out fresh.

I know Tarot isn’t for everyone, but whether or not you are a reader of the cards yourself, tarot-curious, or just a lover of the arts and storytelling, there is much to enjoy in a well-made deck. I love Tarot for its freshness of perspective, for the art and for story, and for how, whenever I come back to the cards, I get a chance to consider a new idea, a new symbol, a new story. To me, when I learn something new, that means possibility, opportunity. I can take what I learn and use it to deepen my understanding of myself and choose or create a path of positive change.

It doesn’t have to be a big, momentous thing. Sometimes the most important steps we take are small…but taking them feels very scary.

Like The Fool, I find myself starting out again this year, in so many ways. Lately, it’s been hard to find the enthusiasm depicted in so many interpretations of this card. Beginnings often come from endings – and the grief of an ending has a way of spilling into the next beginning, coloring it, the bottle of paint turned over, the clean paper splotchy, like my cheeks after a long cry.

If Tarot isn’t your thing, that’s ok. I hope you’ll stick around here anyway. There’s a lot I’d like to write about this year. It’s not going to be an easy year. But we can hold on to each other and look for new and better beginnings – together.

Love,

Erin