Wolf Rocks Overlook, Forbes State Forest

It’s been such a very long time since I’ve been here except in winter.  In fact, it’s possible that I’ve only ever been drawn to Wolf Rocks in the winter.  I don’t seem to have any photos of this place in any other season, nor any memories.  Some places (and people?) are best when they’re dormant and at rest.  The porcupines have ravaged the bark on the upper branches of the trees at Wolf Rocks.  Click on this photo to see.

In 11 years of rare, occasional visits, I've never encountered another human being at this place--until Wednesday of last week.  When I turned onto the short connector trail that leads to the rocks, I saw a fresh pair of small footprints...and realized with a bit of sadness that I would not have the overlook to myself this time.

Worse, I suspected that the person leaving those footprints was a solitude-seeker like myself and almost certainly a woman.  I'm sensitive to the difficulties that a female nature-lover must feel when she's alone on the trail.  I don't think I come across as creepy or dangerous, but all the same, I probably overdo it when I try NOT to seem creepy: smiling, and chattering, and hurrying away...  Anyhow, the young lady didn't seem scared, but we were both a little disappointed to have our solitude interrupted, I think.

I sought a lonely place that I know out on the northern edges of the rock face, where I sat to meditate and read a poem that I'd brought with me, all the while taking in the pleasant view of snow-covered hills beneath the dark vertical pillars of naked trees.  By the time I was finished, she was long gone.  I must say, it was good to have a few hours of winter up there in the highlands.  I miss real winters.

The disappearance of winter has been a nagging sorrow for me.  This is a "first world problem," I know.  The discontents of climate change are serious and life-threatening, and the poorest of the world's people will suffer first and worst.  But I admit that I mostly miss the snow, and the cold, and the whole aesthetic of the winter season.  I miss the whitish glow in a room when the snow on the ground outside refracts the dim, gray light of day back into the room when the sun is hidden.  It's a cool, pale radiance that comes from nowhere and everywhere: snowlight.  I miss the hunkering down, the taking shelter, the feeling of getting cozy inside your den as raging Boreas claims the world outside.  

It's especially fun to hole-up in a tent out on a trail in the winter, when the world is silent and bright.  The late 90s were a 5-year August for me.  I lived in Africa and missed the cold seasons painfully.  I've never stopped missing them even though I've been home for 22 years.  I savor them when they are mine--however briefly--and I long for them when all is sunshine and heat.  This dull gray November limbo that lasts through April is no substitute for the wise solemnity of a genuine winter.  The cold makes us find and face our inner selves.  There's a beauty in the cold that can be found no place else.