Watching the snow fall

I grew up a city girl, taking trips into Manhattan from the time I was old enough to be dragged around museums by my parents.  There's something like imprinting that happens when New York City is the city you first experience.  It became my ur-city, the template for citi-ness deep inside my brain. 

Each neighborhood in Manhattan has its own pulse and rhythm; the City is one continuous improv jam. It was the tune I moved to. 

I always figured I would end up in a big city.  But then I met my husband.  The country mouse.  And he took me to visit his cousins in Montana.

You don't get much more middle of nowhere than in their log cabin on 20 acres up the side of a mountain.

(The cabin, winter 2005)

And I fell in love.

Something about the solitude and the open sky, the unforgiving wildness, the isolation; it spoke to a part of me I didn't know I possessed.

(a winter hike, 2005)

So when it looked like I might not make it back here for our vacation week due to an inopportune appointment with a surgeon on account of a pesky appendix, I was crushed.

But I managed to make it, and here I am, sitting in my cousins' living room watching the snow fall through the large picture windows. 

My boys are all skiing in fresh powder, and while I wish I was making new tracks with them, I am also happy to just be here, as the snow settles and my cousins' ancient irish setter naps beside the wood stove.

(the boys, skiing @ Bridger Bowl, 2006)