First ski this season. We got a good snow this week and today was just brilliantly beautiful. Bub got a pair of snowshoes for Christmas, so he was much better equipped for the trip down to the beaver meadow. It is so very different in the winter then in later summer. 
Best to go down in the winter, you can really move around on the meadow. In the summer the grasses are on pretty fragil bog like ground. Moose, deer, fishers, and the like all come to call. In the winter, very few signs of activity. Some tracks in the woods, but in the open, not much other then a few mice holes near the abondoned beaver lodge.
When we fist moved here, the beaver were active and the meadow was under water. Now just a brook runs and a small pond by the oldest lodge ridge. I imagine that it has been that way for thousands of years. A meadow, then a pond with beaver, then they leave and the pond goes back to beaver meadow. Endless cycle like the winter and the summer.
Bub said that we should come down the old logging road, then cut down though from one end and make our way north to the other end, back track and go the easy way up. The more direct way is through the woods, and I wanted a challange. Bub laughed as I went down trying to get over two trees that were down.
Bub was right about taking the easier route. But I like to ignore practicality and defy the odds when ever I can. But, I do think that next time I will use snow shoes. Much smarter.
After the horsing around we came home to the warmth from our wood stove burning the cords we put up this past summer. Life is pretty good, in spite of all the gloom and doom around us.
Sometimes getting away from all of the stuff and getting back to nature is a good way to put things in perspective. The beaver meadow will again be green in time. Winter is not forever, things change, time continues. This economic winter we are all experiencing should bring closer to us the reminders of what is important. Not the latest i-pod or the newest biggest thing at the mall. The greatest things in life are the good times we have with our loved ones, family and friends. You don’t need a bunch of stuff for that, mearly time to be together. Good times, as Bub says, good times.
