Field Notes: Winter 2025/2026
Postcard to the Woods #6
Dear Woods,
I left behind your quiet shades of winter to visit family in a city where winter is so different — so full of color, sound, fragrance and texture.
On a walk around the urban neighborhood this afternoon, I stopped to listen to Northern Mockingbird whistle, trill and scold from the top of a Tulip Poplar. I wondered, Does this song indicate a shift in the seasons? Has anyone been eagerly anticipating this sound? And then I thought about my joy when I first hear Red-winged Blackbirds singing their return to your beaver ponds.
My thoughts kept circling back to seasons as I continued my walk, looking at tiny yellow and maroon flowers and feeling narrow spikes of Dwarf Mat Rush, smelling pungent leaves of sage and watching Bushtits flying from shrub to shrub as though accompanying me down the street.
You have taught me a nuanced way of telling time. Not by the Gregorian calendar or even temperature or length of day, but by the quality of light and birdsong and mosquitoes and flowers and seeds and tree buds.
I tell you this because I want you to know that wherever I travel, I now carry my woods-attention with me.
Hugs of gratitude,
Marilyn
Shapes of beauty
Blue draws my eyes skyward, and my gaze lingers on the tree branches. Without their leaves, the trees’ shapes and structures are more visible.
My first inclination is to try to name the trees, to identify their species, but I sense an internal no.
Naming is not what this moment calls for.
The trees are asking me to pause. To breathe in wonder. To receive a gift of riches. And to reciprocate: praise the subtle and diverse beauty of their purposeful design.
Branches gnarled, curved, straight,
stout and sturdy, slender,
outstretched and ascending,
angling, dividing, multiplying, narrowing –
reaching for light.
But then, so when, and then
On mornings when the wind chill
is 10°F
and freezing rain
has left a sheet of ice
under the inch of fresh snow,
the hardest part is
getting out the door.
But then
I grow warm walking up the hill.
And the snow sparkles.
And I see tracks friends made on their early morning walk.
And it isn’t as slippery as I expected.
And my footsteps make a crunching sound that makes me think of cornflakes.
So when
I recognize Asha’s I-want-to-go-this-way stance,
I say “Sure,” knowing it will add a mile to our walk.
And then
I notice
the hardest part
becomes
leaving wind and snowy ice behind
through that same door.
Excavating beginnings
Begin now with paper, pen and a hot cuppa.
Begin, earlier today, with a slow walk in the woods, noticing small pockets excavated in the snow and soil.
Begin, last fall, with Eastern Gray Squirrel digging a shallow hole and burying an acorn.
Begin, decades ago, with a different acorn, also buried, but sprouting, and, over the years, growing and flowering, yielding this newly unearthed acorn.
Begin with another acorn and another and another through millennia.
Return to this moment with paper, pen and a hot cuppa. What acorns will this writing yield?
You may also like:
Fall 2025 – Witch-hazel; Romcom in the woods; Postcard to the Woods #5
Summer 2025 – Invocation & benediction; Slow answers
Spring 2025 – A gathering of shiny acorns; Prescription; Why I was late; Once open, there’s no going back
Winter 2024/2025 – The taste of snow; The luminous middle; Old question, new answer; Breadcrumbs; Ice-crusted snow; Untitled (after reading Atticus)
