Alight and Sparkling

It's what happens this far north at the end of the year. I venture out in the firm grip of a bout of cabin fever, looking hungrily for color, symmetry and alignment, and I find myself entranced, not by color, for there is little color in the land of winter, but by the icicles dangling from the eaves of the local monastery, a few despondent fronds of grass poking their heads out of the snowdrifts nearby.

It is far too cold on such days at the end of the year for long photography rambles, and a click here and there must suffice. My breath makes a fine silvery smoke before me as I go along, and my blue fingers scramble frantically for the warm down-lined pockets of my parka at every opportunity.

Then, the sun comes out for a few minutes, and everything is transformed - I'm stopped right in my tracks, bedazzled by a landscape that is alight and sparkling from here to there. Even the aforementioned forlorn grasses are aflame, and they seem to glow from within. All my muttering about cold weather, ice and wind completely forgotten, I drink in the winter light and do a little shining of my own.