The Heart Warms— Now at Principle Gallery, Alexandria
This morning of the small snow I count the blessings, the leak in the faucet which makes of the sink time, the drop of the water on water.
–Charles Olson, The Maximus Poems (1960)
Came out the door of the house a little before 5 this morning and was greeted by a couple of inches of snow I hadn’t been expecting. Guess I should pay more attention to the weather reports.
The snow was lovely though. It was light and fluffy and filled with frozen, shiny ice crystals, the kind that glimmer on the surface like gems in the moonlight.
When I walked it made a crunching sound under my foot. There was no wind nor even a breeze and the trees were quiet as though they intently listening. This made me aware of the surrounding absolute quiet that allowed me to hear the crunch of my footsteps.
Listening deeper now, I could hear the sound of falling snowflakes coming to rest on the ground.
It’s such a delicate sound. Hearing these tiny soft taps has a calming, slowing effect on me, allowing me to take a more relaxed stance that makes the cold feel less biting.
I no longer feel the need to hurry through the snow to the studio. Instead, I linger for a few precious moments in the woods and absorb the blessing of the snow quiet.
For that brief instance, I feel gloriously and placidly distant from the woes and worries of the world.
And I know in a flash of realization that is just what I needed this morning– an elixir to reset and resync the inner self that had been knocked out of rhythm in recent days.
There’s some sort of magic in the snow quiet.
I may not be certain about much in this world, but I am positive about this.
Let’s have a song for the first Sunday Morning Music of the New Year. I was planning on playing a different song from one of my favorites, the Irish singer/songwriter Lisa Hannigan, but this particular song and performance is such a natural partner for the words above that that other song will have to wait for another morning. This is her song Snow. It has that snow quiet feel. Just lovely.
Redtree Times 
I so agree, Gary! The quiet of a snowfall is magical. I love waking up and feeling the calm it brings me when I look out. When I was teaching, if I knew I had a snow day the next day, I would stay up and go for a walk as the snow would fall. The peace and joy it brought me was remarkable. Somehow I felt renewed.
I still love the snow- as it drifts slowly down to the earth to provide a loving blanket on the ground. I don’t love shoveling so much or driving in it in the DC area (although I grew up in WV where it was right of passage) but the few occasions it does snow here, I get excited to listen to the whispers of snow and see the beauty of the world.
I love the song… it is haunting to me, yet beautiful!
All of the sounds and silences you described are ones I well remember from my time in snow country. Snow is a great equalizer, as well. One of my most memorable experiences of walking in silently falling snow took place not in the country, but at night, in the middle of Manhattan. I still can recall nearly every detail.
I have had that same experience, Linda, and the quiet of snow in a big city is truly magical. Another time in February of 2005, we were staying at a NYC hotel on the upper eastside, a few blocks from the park. One of the nights we were there, 6 or 7 inches of snow fell. Being an early riser, I set out into the snow. The side street heading to the park had not been plowed and only a couple of sets of footprints were visible in the crisp snow. So quiet. I crossed a still unplowed 5th Avenue into the park whose paths were untouched. The Gates exhibit from the artist Christo was up then and the bright orange colors of the fabric that adorned the gates absolutely exploded in the snow and the silence it created. Magic.
Just the idea of being surprised by a snow is so outside my experience so as to sound totally magical. Only twice in my life has that happened. Seven decades and only two magical snows. But even after all these years the memories of those two magical nights still resonate within the lifetime of my experiences.
On another note, thanks for the introduction to Lisa Hannigan. I will be spending some time exploring her catalog. What a beautiful and magical voice.
Oh, I have also had many less than magical moments in the snow, Gary. There’s nothing magical about trying to change a starter on an old Buick in a parking lot with 6″ snow in the dark. But there are those moments like this morning that erase those less perfect memories, and it is magic. I am glad you have even those two, Gary. AS for Lisa Hannigan, you have to listen to this song, Undertow, from several years ago at the beginning of the pandemic with the singer Loah. The two of them together are truly magical.
Gary, Undertow led me to her cover of Moon River. That’s a track that could be used as a soundtrack to accompany a set of your moonscape paintings. Beautiful music all…