![\"snow](\"http:\/\/www.ecotropy.net\/php\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/snow-trees.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"I\u2019ve walked in these hemlocks and white pines often. I love getting lost among<\/p>\n
their cylinders and angles, bending this way and that \u2013 still getting caught on<\/p>\n
branches. All the while, I inhale deeply, getting as much of that resinous air into<\/p>\n
my lungs and nose and I can \u2013 feeling the tingle of it as it makes its way deep into<\/p>\n
my esophagus. Somehow today they seemed different \u2013 I think it is the snow.<\/p>\n
The contrast of the dark of the branches covered by and against the crystalline<\/p>\n
white of the newly fallen snow was intoxicating. Everything became an abstraction<\/p>\n
for that moment, and then I was back to the base tenor of the wind in the trees,<\/p>\n
scattering the accumulation of snow \u2013 to make it look like so many veils floating to<\/p>\n
earth from some tall cliff or tower. Trying to move through this copse on feet is<\/p>\n
yoga, on skiis it\u2019s dangerous.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
I got back home and went into the old picture box we have of the farm. Where<\/p>\n
I just was used to be the carriage road heading up to Whately. There were no trees<\/p>\n
there then. The photo dates to the twenties. It\u2019s hard to reconcile the density<\/p>\n
of trees in that place now. One would never know that there ever was an absence<\/p>\n
of trees around here. But listening and understanding signs and names reveals the<\/p>\n
story of this valley \u2013 Potash Brook, for the camps that came here after the French<\/p>\n
and Indian War and burned the big, beautiful trees to make ash for soap. Or, that<\/p>\n
the area is also called Screwsville, for the wooden screw factory that once was<\/p>\n
here. The story of this land is dense with memory and stories of all kinds<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n