To everything there is a season

“You’re going out in this?” My neighbor’s response was high-pitched when I phoned to see if she wanted to take a walk, as we often do together. Living in the woods of Western Montana, our dirt roads offer the option of a sylvan, serene, and relatively safe two, four, or six-mile circle. On this particular morning, the 26th of October, the first snowflakes of the season were drifting past my window. Just a few. “It’s snowing!” she offered as explanation for her shock.

So? No problem; I’ll go alone. While every one of my friends bemoans the inevitable slip of summer and on its heels the icing-on-the-cake Indian ones like we’ve just had and sometimes enjoy during September and early October, I stand alone as one who welcomes the change of season—every season. Turn, turn, turn. Among other enviable features, it gives me more to write about.

“Is it fall or winter?” Beth raised her arms to the sky in frustration yesterday after eating lunch in Missoula when, no sun in sight we walked to our cars that were parked under dazzling autumn orange foliage, and felt the distinct drop in temperature.

“Is that snow on the mountaintop just west of town?” I asked her, hardly able to contain my joy. I adore this combination of gloom and glamour; it’s a visual feast that any photographer will attest to--such blazing colors offer a stellar performance against a darkening sky.

I couldn’t help Beth in her quandary. Equally futile as defining brunch as either breakfast or lunch, winter is rarely a marked line in the fallen leaves. Generally, she reveals herself a little at a time, today being the first tease of promises that lie ahead—late mornings when I can either head out the backdoor while strapping on my snowshoes or simply stand in the front yard with my face turned skyward and allow the snowflakes to soundlessly assault my skin.

“Our winter is so long,” groans Sally, another of my acquaintances who, it’s true, has lived here longer than I. “I’m just not ready.”

How do I explain it to her? Having come from a climate where four seasons are virtually the same, I still find the variety rather thrilling. Getting out in it challenges and invigorates, then necessarily invites recouperation: the lazy afternoon by a fire, writing, reading, knitting, taking a long hot bath—pleasures that need not feel guilty. Of course, I should mention that it helps to be retired.

And there are those subtle sub-seasonal shifts within winter. The blizzardy depth of December, for example, is the perfect time to clean my closet and scour the wooden floors; why resort to such chores while summer sun beckons and fall feet rush inside saturated by the river? Likewise, in March’s mud month I enjoy ready rationale for not bothering—both wood and wardrobe will only get dirty again. There is the proper season for everything. Turn.

Outdoors and shod accordingly, I can walk in wonder of any weather. And so, outward I go this morning, no neighbors biting my bait. I unearth from bottom dresser drawer quintessential Patagonia pants and protective shirt, pull on fleece jacket and zip it to the chin, grab gloves, and wool hat. I open this log cocoon to the blast of arctic air. Glorious.

Hunting season opened a few days ago, and so the deer do not lift their white tails, hiss, and flee from my purposeful path. No shooting is allowed in our neck of the woods, and my guess is that they have perceived that here, they are not prey, but protected. They’ve congregated in safe haven and this morning they stand still, dozens of them, in easy proximity where they gaze upon me, unafraid, as I pass, puffs of my warm breath apparent on the cold air. And when I glint Beth’s house that is tucked back in the woods and around a corner, I wave and call out to no one as a buck lifts its head to wonder of my words, “You don’t know what you’re missing!”

My cheeks freeze, my nose runs, my eyes water, and I pump my arms even harder than usual in order to ward off the chill. Autumn still burns brightly in the larch trees until at one vista, the view I’ve nicknamed “my favorite valley,” I stop cold at the spectacle before me: the fire of fall and the pallor of winter, all in one October hour.

Breathless, I turn from such inexplicable splendor and speed up to hurry home. Now that I’ve felt the flurries, I’ll keep my afternoon date with the keyboard. And a time to every purpose under heaven.