Weary of deep snow and icy cold, I am even a little tired of the color blue at times, no matter how intensely blue the sky is or snowdrifts or spruce trees or the cast iron crane out on the deck. Its migratory kin have been gone for months, but our splendid metal bird is frozen in place, and it is well and truly stuck in place until springtime rolls around again. I like looking at it.
There are some lovely words for blue in the English language: azure, beryl, cerulean, cobalt, indigo, lapis lazuli, royal, sapphire, turquoise, ultramarine, to name just a few. I recite them like a litany under my breath as I look out at our sleeping garden with mug in hand or break a trail into the woods.
Just when I decide that I am all wintered out and will not sketch another icicle or frame another photo of such things, another eloquent winter composition presents itself to the eye. Something curved or fragile or delicately robed in snow shows up and begs rapt and focused attention. Glossy bubbles dance in the icicles above a frozen creek in the Lanark highlands. Snow crystals adorn the evergreens over my head and make them blaze like diamonds. As I lurch along, faded and tattered oak leaves flutter down to lie on the trail at my feet. Pine and spruce cones cast vivid blue shadows in pools of early morning sunlight. Is there anything on the planet as fine as the scent of snowy blue spruce boughs in February? Look closely, and every needle is wearing stars.
Small and perfect, complete within itself, each entity conveys an elemental peace and equilibrium, lowers the blood pressure and stills the breathing, returns my eyes and focus to simplicity and grace and just plain old being here. For a minute or two, my pain recedes and balance returns. It is a miracle that I am standing here at all, and these fleeting moments on the edge of the woods have to be enough. They are enough, and they are more than enough.
Worlds great and small everywhere, worlds within and worlds without, and every one is a wonder to behold and remember and love with my eyes and patient recording lens. Surely, I can do this for a little while longer.
3 comments:
Oh please keep recording for us a little longer. I rarely comment but I love every post and have for years.
I agree, please keep posting your observant letters!xx
Friday Rambles are always the highlight of the week for me. The words give me something to mull over. A kind of synthesis happens to my day. For example, on Friday, B.C. had a snowfall. The words you wrote for the color blue played a big part on the my day. It was almost as if reading your morning meditation put a lense and filter on my day.
This particular photo is unbelievable beautiful.
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