I arrive to Colorado just in time for a spring time snowstorm. I’m open about the fact that I love cold weather. In fact, nine times out of ten, I prefer it to hot. I especially like cold weather in high altitude locations. So long as I have the right gear. For, I’ve also learned to qualify that while I like the cold, I don’t like to be cold. But this time, having set my expectations for hours of fresh air, sun accompanied hikes, warmth, and dry trails, I find myself lightly resentful of the sky’s weeklong gloom.
Ah, but it’s
spring. Spring with its temperamental moods. Not so dissimilar from my own of
late.
While the dogs I’m watching take out their energy inside to allay their cabin fever, dashing madly from room to room, I drink a lot of tea. I watch the snow fall in earnest. I stand at the window and stare out as all those unique snowflakes fall in concert to make thick and uniform comforters over every surface. The leaf bearing trees hang low their branches with the weight of the snow. Some branches can’t bear the weight. Some days I feel the same.
One afternoon, warding off my own cabin fever, I go for a walk to get some of that longed-for fresh air and to see what damage has been done.
A neighbor passes and I say, “Poor trees.”
She says, “First the windstorm in December and now this.”
There’s a Scandinavian saying, “There’s no bad weather, only bad clothes.” Since I first read it, I’ve kept the quote in the back pocket of my mind and taken it out occasionally to use in conversation or in my own thoughts. Still, the trees didn’t know not to put on their leaves just yet. Once budded and then full grown, they couldn’t easily put them off and then put them on again later. Maybe the quote is only meant to refer to human clothing. Anyway, the damage—however mild or extreme—is already done. Poor trees.
Already above freezing, the air is turning springward again and wet drops fall from tree and roof and sky. Rain will soon enough melt all the snow away. But, I’m okay, I’m wearing a waterproof jacket over my fleece and other jacket. I sidestep the broken branches in the street and on the sidewalk, I skirt the half-hanging branches not fully severed from their trees.
In the park, I pack a snowball and toss it across the field. There’s a child-sized snowman off to my right. Some children have sleds and are trying the small hill on the south end of the park. The snow on the sidewalks is slush under my hiking shoes. I step over puddles.
I’m not completely dissatisfied, but I’m also not content. And not for the first time (and probably not for the last), in the middle of that not quite settled, not quite unsettled feeling, I wish I had the grace and equanimity to take joy in every situation I find myself in. It’s probably a choice. I’m sure it’s a choice. I remember, a year or so ago in Oregon, a day of unexpected snow when I dashed to put on my coat, gloves, and hat and ran out in it as wild as the cabin-fevered dogs I’ve left behind me at the house. Exhilarated by the cold against my cheeks and by the large flakes that fell on my face like tears of joy.
There’s a lesson about expectation here. Somewhere. I formed the idea long ago that expectation and need were the two things that often bring about the downfall of many relationships. Now I see that expectation doesn’t limit itself to interpersonal connection.
Can I live without expectation? Or can I adjust my reactions when my expectations aren’t exactly met?
I’m sure the answer is yes to both. Can implies able. Being willing and actually managing myself are other matters. Be perfect, I tell myself. No, I argue gently back. No, always try to be better than you were yesterday, but give yourself the grace to be who you are at any given time and feel what is in that moment with you.
It sounds good.
I don’t really know how to do that yet.
And I still want to be perfect. But I know the dangers of perfectionism. I put it off long ago. Setting aside the pursuit of perfection for the pursuit of excellence. A more rewarding path. A kinder trail. A more freeing way to live.
It doesn’t take long, usually, in Colorado for the roads to clear. Still, because the car I’m driving is my friend’s, I’m extra careful with it. I wait the days until the weather has completely passed before driving to a trail I hadn’t been able to fully explore the summer before.
A mile or so in, I leave the main trail for a smaller one leading through the trees. Not long later, I cross a brook, once here to go this way, twice there to continue with the path, and head upward. Always upward. Snow lines the path. Human tracks and dog tracks are imprinted in the soft slush, in the harder packed snow, in the mud along the way coming and going. I’m reminded of the springs I experienced in the Wyoming wilderness. Of the many trails I walked or skied alone there with no footprints to follow but those of wolves, moose, and coyotes. Once or twice, of bear. Of the tree-lined paths, half covered in snow, half sodden with mud.
I’m reminded also of the Norwegian forests I wandered in. There too, the snow dusted the ground and I went out, bundled up in proper clothing, wishing I could be there later in the winter when the snow would be thick enough to ski upon. Satisfied to be there in that moment while simultaneously still wanting something else. I compare this current moment to that one. I compare this path to the half-snowed paths in Wyoming which I could still ski down so long as the snow was two ski-widths thick alongside the mud. Sometimes only one ski width thick. Similar but not the same.
Comparison, like expectation, can also be dangerous. Comparison can also be joyful.
Walking now, I find myself being filled up with all the paths I’ve ever walked. Alone or with others. In all kinds of weather, in good moods and bad. With expectations of what I would find and without. Now, on this day, for whatever reason, I’m still lightly dissatisfied. But I can’t put my finger on what I had wanted. Not until I see a turn that promises me something.
Something that when I reach it settles the oscillating, unstable core in the center of my being.
An overlook. A break in the trees that opens to unmeasurable vastness. A view of distant places from somewhere high up. An expanse of wild space, tree, mountain, horizon, sky, undisturbed by humanmade things.
I go up to find these views. A moment of stillness to stop, to breathe, to hold my breath, and to see as far as I can. To be in the presence of beauty. To know that I am a part of this grand display of nature, this expanse, this vastness. So small, but so high up. To feel a moment of godness and power. A moment of being.
Undisturbed. Centered.
Standing near the edge, I take a drink of water. I look out as far as a I can. White clouds against a blue sky. Green against blue. Shades of green with purple, yellow. Satisfied, for now, I head back down.
It’s spring. And there will be other cloudy days. Other rainfall. Perhaps even another snowstorm. My discontent will build. That core in the center of my being will begin to oscillate again. I will compare. I will often still prize perfection over excellence. Until I remember. Until I remember all the trails I’ve walked and all the views I’ve seen from so high up. Until I remember who I am.
At the beginning of the trail again, back at the parking lot, I get in the car and drive homeward to the dogs who can now go outside and run to their hearts’ content.
