As the last day of January comes to its end, it would be a mistake to think that

Mother Winter will release her white world
any time soon.

Walking with Misha

Misha loves to run.

As soon as she is let off  leash she will run

around and around and around me ,

sometimes up to five times or more with out stopping.

 Once all the excess energy and pure joy of running fast is
finished it is time to check out the surroundings

Beautiful colors of Winter.

I only went out for a walk and finally concluded to stay out till sundown, for going out, I found, was really going in.  ~John Muir, 1913

Captured by this photograph of a  young girl's gaze ,

 I penciled a likeness hoping to 

portray the calm reflective feeling.

Images from this week

Not far from where I live is a small park. Making time to walk in nature quiets my mind, but that day it was cold and very windy and I almost thought of going back home till I remembered the geography of this place.

There is a section that is like a deep bowl. A limestone bluff and the creek form one side...

and if I walk eighty paces or so, a steep tree covered hillside is on the other side.

This is where  the wind stopped and the quiet began.

 A hole in the ice covered creek, the water still moving.

wonderful patterns of snow paint images on the bluff.

so quiet it was, but for the

 the sound of the Nuthatch.

The Peace of Wild Things

BY WENDELL BERRY

When despair for the world grows in me

and I wake in the night at the least sound

in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,

I go and lie down where the wood drake

rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.

I come into the peace of wild things

who do not tax their lives with forethought

of grief. I come into the presence of still water.

And I feel above me the day-blind stars

waiting with their light. For a time

I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.

winter walk

 Sleeping Misha

 Bernie preparing to nap.

Snoring Mimi

A few drawings with pen.We all seem to be in hibernation mode these days.

A wonderful description of getting lost in the reverie of nature. 

 "In the darkness round me flitted thousands of fire-flies and out beyond this pool of utter night flew by unceasingly the white foam of the rapids; sound there was none save their thunder.  The majesty and beauty of the scene fascinated me, and I stood leaning with my back against a rock pinnacle watching it.  Do not imagine it gave rise... to those complicated, poetical reflections natural beauty seems to bring out in other peoples minds.  ...I just lose all sense of human individuality, all memory of human life, with its grief and worry and doubt, and become part of the atmosphere.  If I have a heaven, that will be mine.... " Mary Kingsley Explorer 1862-1900.' Travels in West Africa'

        My interpretation,

Ink pen and Water Color

Winterberries

I brought in a sprig of Winterberry today,

so bright and crimson it was

against a black velvet pillow.

so beautiful is its shadow.

A small window of time, after the first snow, before they are taken for food I  bring in winterberry from my shrub behind the house. A male and female plant, they are interdependent on each other to bear fruit. 

Tiny beads of crimson joy.

Beauty is not caused. It is.      Emily Dickinson

Wonderment and creating stories. 

While driving in the country I saw some empty homes that reminded me of a poem I once read about an abandoned house.

 Homes that are abandoned,  particularly old farm houses, are aching to tell their stories.

 I no longer have the poem to quote from directly but here are some sketches I made and words that came to mind.

The curtains blowing out of a window propped open.
The stillness and quiet, made more poignant by the sound of blowing leaves and wind.