Pedestrian Snow Events

Snow Path 2
Originally uploaded by da bern.

This has been a beautiful day in winter. I was out for a walk in
brilliant sunshine. Our house backs onto a uncared for public space
surrounding a drainage channel which is linked to a neighbourhood park
and then to a par 3 golf course. There are enough pathways in the snow
made by the collective footsteps of myself and my neighbours to make
the 40 minute outing easy going.

These temporary winter paths are like stories of recent undertakings
of people on foot. Drifts deeply cut with human tresspass;
footprints breaking through the skin of ice; dog tracks alongside bas
relief prints from the bottoms of industrial age footwear. I found
places where children ran knee deep sorties disturbing the eloquent
white space that may have awed them. There are steep icy slicks on
the sides of the channel where kid friends tickle their senses with
the help of gravity.

The dogs warm themselves by running full out along the trails and
then rubbing their heads on the hard packed snow.

If I hold my view downward for a long time letting the path skim by
while I walk, with the low angled sun on the edge of my vision, I feel
like I am in a trance. Its like I am in midwinter.