Of all the nerve. A moose plunged through our snowy wonderland.
The neighborhood Bullwinkle gouged the back forty trail. My trail. I have slogged a reliable floor on snow shoes by compressing numberless, nearly weightless flakes — bound together by weather and gumption.
Moose tracks boggle my sense of proportion. Those hoof prints could be family-size canned hams.
And those gouges compromise balance: a boot teeters, an ankle gives way. No wonder my usually mellow soul bristles.
Overnight, the gentle herbivore collapsed whole sections of trail I have carved and re-carved, daily, over four months. Through sleet and sunlight and once, near whiteout.
Come spring, I mean to jog again. A gear junkie would buy snow shoes designed for running. I’m too cheap. For now, dogged phlogg-ing fuels my training regimen:
- pitch body forward
- trust metal claws
- let poles swing, plant, propel
Rhythm cuts the trail.
Most days something pent up inside hollers, Move it! Make your way through this booby-trapped world.
But what about the wilderness carried within? Some of us crave drama. Others dodge it. How to navigate those unexpected sinkholes that compromise footing?
Weight wise, a bull moose is the equivalent of a grand piano. In the midst of deep drifts, the toes splay — akin to snow shoes. Each hoof’s surface area increases, which minimizes how far those long legs can sink.
The hoof is a hardworking trinity. There are compacted shock absorbers. Two cloven toes function like our middle and ring finger. A dew claw becomes weight bearing and enhances agility, like our pointer and pinky.
Ingenious.
And . . . almost heart-shaped. A terrible magnificence has cratered my sacred aisle, through bowed-over knapweed, through powder and windswept ripples and hummocks of ice.
Caprice? Necessity? Irreversible ruin?
Poet Molly Peacock writes about sustaining “a respect for emergence.” Bound to be awkward. Guaranteed to counter preferred rhythms.
Ideally, perhaps we navigate the intrusive by remaining attentive. Patient.
What if we welcome unwanted traffic on our perceived turf? What if something gentle yet powerful we’ve yet to identify calls to us now, from below the surface?
Lord, be our balance, our surefooted joy.
Friends, what keeps you nimble in challenging times?
P.S. You might enjoy this poem I wrote (many thanks to publisher Katie Manning, Whale Road Review)
Tracks
1
Loneliness moves by stab
and creak over winter hills—
crossbite of straps,
cunning hoops with teeth. Like prayer,
snowshoes re-float the body,
distribute its burden.
Wood or aluminum,
baskets-and-poles —
be our wings. Our boats.
Surrogate bones.
2
Fences run with the hills.
Snow fleas pepper the snow
beneath spruce. Skitter of mice
in whiskery lines, strut
and splay of the wild turkey.
Beneath my flat blue shadow
and, deeper down, the memory
of bared soles, mingled
with fossils. Today:
practice not sinking.
*****
“. . . yet I will rejoice in the LORD . . . my strength . . . he enables me to tread on the heights” (Habakkuk 3:18, 19a, NIV).
From the archives, you might also enjoy: Lessons from a Moose
*Quote, Molly Peacock, A Friend Sails in on a Poem.
Photo by Ivars Krutainis on Unsplash
Thank you, friend, for this new perspective….
I love these lines, “What if something gentle yet powerful we’ve yet to identify calls to us now, from below the surface?
Lord, be our balance, our surefooted joy.”
What keeps me nimble? Four questions from my Spiritual Director, taped above my desk–each day:
SLOW DOWN (talk less, listen more)
BE EXPECTANT
PAY ATTENTION
RECEIVE
Practicing that…..probably forever 🙂
Dear friend, I too have been gathering hope from that thought. Thank you for bringing it to my attention again today. I needed the reminder.
I LOVE the quartet of words you read to yourself every day. I want to practice those too.
Could we call them Invitational Imperatives for Well-being? So they seem to me as I read them and set my heart to live them . . .
Laurie Laurie! You excavator, you! A happening happens around you. A word lands on a page, a metaphor nudges notice, a moose tromps through your path…and you begin your dig! Unearthing the trinity hoof, how white snow can pepper, and what , in Heaven’s Name , does all that have to do with my day to day trudge anyway?
And then you bring fossil marrow to life for us to ponder and live into. For Goodness sake, Laurie!!
Over and over you do this for us. Thank you.
Dear Judy, writing toward the Mystery remains one of my great (often taxing) joys; hearing my attempt resonates with another person is a blessing almost too great to hold. Shazam (“to set in motion a wondrous feat”)! Even as I type these words I realize I’m not to meant to hold the blessing but rather, offer this up, as well.
That all may be well.
IS well, because of Him . . . if we could but see it.
Here’s to the sightings we share with each other: however, whenever, wherever they appear! You, friend, have shared so many glimmers with me.
Being a creature of habit, I too bristle at unwelcome hindrances and interruptions–especially in my time-territory where I’ve already charted my own agenda. But what about God’s agenda? It’s so easy for me to forget: what I consider a hindrance and interruption he calls opportunity and divine appointment. Thankfully God’s still working on me; I think he might be making progress.
Nancy, I too guard my schedule, and my little quirks and habits. I just know I have missed opportunities gently laid before me and hope I too am making some headway in responding more quickly.
Thanks so much for being here, friend. I value your words and life.
P.S. Bet you’re making more progress than you know. : > )
I can see the trail in my mind Thank you. My interruptions don’t have hooves but I stomp my foot at them anyway.
Anne, the energy of that stomp translates right through my screen. : > )
I sure relate — and in two ways, as I think about it:
1) when I stomp in frustration, and
2) when I need to put my foot down and declare a boundary
Thank you for widening my view!
Thank you so much for this piece! Such riches here for the mind, heart, and ear, Laurie. I mean, every couple inches of screen, holds a multitude. “Surrogate bones,” “Practice not sinking,” and I have to mention, “family-size canned hams.” <3
A bull moose in your path,
My modest comfort-coffee no longer shelved nearby,
Timely words highlighted at unexpected moments,
A surprise present of poems showing up in my Inbox.
Frustration, partial-success, found gifts.
What can I glean from all this and what's next?
A flash of insight in the bird's nest.
Dear Bethany, I love hearing from you.
I am richer today for your heartening words as well as your couplets!
And that tantalizing image of promise in the last line.
I so hope last year’s robin comes back to its nest on our deck this spring. I am reminded to watch for it. Thank you!
May your gleanings today feed your spirit and direct your steps.
Thank you so much, Laurie! Your words are generative, nourishing, and encouraging to me.
Hoping with you for the robin’s return, as well as your jogging steps—
Thank you! And yes, here’s to both hopes materializing — or something inspiring to take their place.
Happy unfolding spring to you, friend!
As I read your offering with a sharp sense of imagining what your experience gave to words, Fanny Crosby’s line was just below the surface of my own expression,
“… and He cheers each winding path I tread.”
“Today: Practice not sinking.”
Thank you.
https://youtu.be/LTZjUQWxH74
Dear Rick, thank you for that line, especially that word “cheers” . . .
and for the link to that arrangement and performance of Crosby’s marvelous lyrics . . .
just what I need before heading out on the daily “run. ”
As ever, you enrich my understanding, friend.
Thank you.
What keeps me nimble in hard times? Good habits. The very fact of “habit” means that it can sustain almost without thought. A kind of auto-pilot. This provides stability, no matter what else is required.
So interesting how we come to “own” the places we continually travel. Interesting to think of what and who else also “owns” it. Sharing? What does that look like?
Wow, “auto-pilot” . . . as a good thing! That grabs my attention.
The phrase second nature also comes to mind. O to cultivate habits that stabilize us, no matter the terrain.
I especially want to think more about the idea of assumed ownership you bring up. No wonder I felt nettled. Like all that acreage is somehow mine because I stomp through it every day? Lord make me a scout as well as a navigator for common ground — out back, and in all interactions. A-MEN.