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Kate Spring

~ growing a deep-rooted life

Kate Spring

Tag Archives: skiing

Winter Secrets

19 Thursday Jan 2012

Posted by Kate Spring in Nature/Environment, Wildness

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

animals, photography, skiing, snowshoeing, winter

The winter holds secrets: field mice tunnel under the snow, their trails hidden to the eye above the crust; black bear disappear into dens, giving birth and feeding their young all before coming out of torpor in the spring; weasels and snowshoe hares shed their summer coats for white ones, camouflaging themselves against predators; and each new snow covers the trails of animals to make it seem as if they never gave themselves away in the first place.  Between snowfalls, though, winter lets you in.

Deer, snowshoe hare, coyote, bobcat, squirrel, raccoon: their tracks tell me of their presence.  Every time I go into the woods, I see the paths of animals all around me, though rarely do I see their bodies.  That’s okay with me; knowing life moves through these woods all winter is enough, and each time I come upon traces of animals I stop to inspect.  It is because of this I can never move quickly through the trees—it sometimes seems that each time I pick up my feet another detail catches my eyes, and I stop again.  I must admit, I am new at track identification, but between common sense and a good field guide, I’m learning.  The small hoof prints of deer have been familiar to me since childhood, but I only recently learned that cat tracks are clawless, unlike those of dogs, and that the shape of the ball pads also differs between the two animal families.

Last week, Edge came home from the Green River Reservoir, where he was out skiing with the dogs, and showed me this picture of an owl’s imprint:

Owl in Snow, photo by Edge Fuentes

I marveled at it as he described coming upon it, a single large pattern in the snow with no tracks around it.  We were both puzzled, thinking we should be able to see the line of a mouse beneath the snow, but later I read how owls can hear their prey in the subnivian zone, and thus often rely on their ears instead of their eyes for winter hunting.  The owl did indeed find food that day.

When I go out on snowshoes instead of skis, I explore steeper slopes and areas more dense with trees.  A few days ago, I climbed up on top of a knoll where balsams grow close, and found snowshoe hare tracks casually leading this way and that.  Not too far from there, where the land depresses into a bowl and a small field opens up, the hare’s tracks appear much farther apart, and I imagined the animal bouncing quickly through the open space before slowing once again amidst the shelter of evergreens with their branches hanging low, laden with snow.

There is of course more to the winter woods than animals—there is the snow, the frozen streams and the ice that clings to rock: water pausing in its colder forms and reminding us of the beauty of slowing down.  As a child, I’d stare wide-eyed at frozen waterfalls along the highway and skid to a stop near any wall of ice along resort ski-trails.  Now I snowshoe or cross-country ski, moving slower to find the smaller strands of ice.  My father taught me this—to look for the details in the land—and as I crouch down to get the right angle, I think briefly of winter walks and morning drives together, each of us equipped with a camera, and my father always stopping suddenly when he’d see it, the picture, and me learning to be patient and to look.

Ice, photo by Katie Spring

Ice, photo by Katie Spring

The winter holds secrets: freezing rain can come one night and transform the details you found; snowstorms and wind can fill in the tracks and create snow-dunes where there were none before; the arctic air can snap so cold that you stay inside, baking and drinking tea while the lives in the forest continue on in their own ways.  Patience, patience.  If you look, the winter lets you in.

Dogs on Snowshoe Trail, photo by Katie Spring

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Weekend Forecast: -20

21 Friday Jan 2011

Posted by Kate Spring in Nature/Environment, Seasons, Wildness, Writing

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

environment, home, mountains, nature, place, poetry, skiing, Vermont, winter, writing

A cold weekend is close ahead, and we’ve kept our wood stove stoked.

The calendar says sixty days until spring

but the frigid air and clear sky say longer.

We are stocked with roots: potatoes, parsnips, beets, turnips, carrots

And yesterday we received a small taste of summer in a jar of pesto.

On the mountain the trees are thick with frost

Noses are red from wind, and toes are like ice cubes in boots

Still we go out

Into the winter

Breathing

Moving

Sweating

Still we go out into the cold

So we may remember the serious beauty of stillness

And be thankful for the glowing comfort of warmth.

 

 

 

 

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Money or No Money

07 Friday Jan 2011

Posted by Kate Spring in Family, Travel, Writing

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

family, growing, growth, home, learning, lfe, love, money, place, skiing, teaching, thoughts, winter, writing

Farming and traveling.  For the last two years this is what I have done, and now I am doing neither.  Shortly after returning to Vermont from Alaska, I decided to work as a ski instructor with my brother, Jeff, at a nearby resort.  I am happy that I have a job, but I miss the rhythm of growing food.  Working at the resort, I find myself constantly asking, “Why am I doing this?”  There is something about this job that keeps me stressed–a multitude of things perhaps–like the constant shuffling of the schedule and the uncertainty of getting a lesson on slow weeks; the pulling of rank that happens among instructors and supervisors; the feeling of working at a place where a guest may spend more money in one week than I will make fore the entire season.

For the first time in my life I am noticing the inequities of money close-up, enhanced by the fact that I am also paying rent, which I have never done until now.  My first week of living here, between rent, food and car repair costs, left $5 in my bank account–a number that sent an empty shock to my stomach.  Now, after a month of work and weekly paychecks I am comfortable again, though the number for comfort has lowered.

I am not angry that some people have money when others don’t; in fact, with less money I am understanding what I have always known: happiness comes from the love arising out of each moment and taking the time to see it.  Instead I am frustrated at the hold money takes over life, and the value our society adds to the people who do have it.  I notice myself get more wrapped up in money than I ever have before, worrying and stressing to the point of tears, feeling under-appreciated if I don’t get a tip, and allowing money to blind me to the joy of working outside and teaching everyday.  I am allowing myself to forget what happiness is.  Perhaps what I need more than anything right now is an allowance of quiet moments.

On New Year’s Eve day I came home worn out and crying.  Edge held me an listened, and when Jeff came home he sat with me at the kitchen counter, offering insight.

He told me, “I’m doing this job because skiing has played such a huge role in my life.  If I can get kids excited about skiing and let that be a conduit for their relationship with nature, or even just a way to get them outside, then that’s great.”

He talked about his experience getting to know the mountain last year, and how special it is.

“When you get off the trail and into the woods, it’s so quiet, and it can feel like you’re the only one on the mountain.”

Jeff’s goal is not to make money, but to open up a whole world to kids and show them a way to be in it.  And that was my mistake.  I came into this job viewing it as a temporary way to make money until I could do what I really wanted.  Of course, I’ve always loved teaching so that was a plus, but now I see that this job is not as limiting as my view of it.  Ski instructing allows me to teach and share the small victories of improvement–balance, stopping, turning–and watch kids move through the winter in a new way; it allows me to live in a beautiful house and spend time with my brother, who is the reason I moved to Cambridge and the reason for so much joy in my life.

So last Monday I started fresh, and am seeing again the opportunities that each day brings.

I wake up.  I drink tea with Edge.  I write.

At work I laugh and encourage.  Yesterday I even had time to ski over to the larger mountain for a personal run, and for the first time saw Mt. Mansfield rising up to the right, lit up by the afternoon sun, and felt the wonder Jeff talked about finally come over me.

In the evenings I come home and bring Nobee outside.  At night Jeff and Edge play music, and I sing with them.  I do have time to sit quietly and reflect, to do the things I want to do, and to spend time with the people I love, and for this I am thankful.  Money or no money, I am living, and the joy that comes from simply being is the joy that I cherish the most.

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Welcome!

Kate Spring

Kate Spring

Welcome to The Good Heart Life: an organic gardening and lifestyle blog where we grow beauty, joy, and nourishment for the body, soul, and earth. I'm Kate Spring: organic farmer, mother, and chief inspiration officer at Good Heart Farmstead and The Good Heart Life. Grow along with us, and together we'll cultivate a more lively, joyful world one {organic} seed at a time.

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