Wednesday, December 17, 2008

Wisconsin In Winter


Porcuppine Mountains Ski Hill

Last night another three inches of cold dry snow fell, enough to have to clear the driveway in preparation for what promises to be the Mother of snowfalls coming tomorrow night. We're to expect six or even ten inches, maybe even thirteen inches of snow.

I love it. Let it come. Anke the German Shepherd snow dog is fully in her element, two ridiculous layers of fur keeping her snug. She can sleep all warm and tucked in in her inside kennel, or sneak out the two-way door into the back to roll in the snow.

For the humans living here at the ranch, the snow is most welcome: out in the country; the furnace works great; the pantries are stocked. My shop is filled with interesting jobs to distract me during the day, and no one has anywhere to go.

I take a daily walk with Furperson down the road to the pass (I call it the pass; it is just a small rise where the trees on each side of the road converge, exactly one mile south from our house)
and back. The walk to me is perfectly representative of the Wisconsin countryside: large hollow bowls of cleared fields and long ridges of thick woods. A few large farm houses. I never tire of what I see--surprising isn't it?

The dog in winter gets some time off the leash to hunt odors and the occasional road kill. This pup of eighteen months, and I are slowly coming to terms with each other. Furperson is much too intelligent for her own good, and it keeps getting her into trouble with her owner. She gets a look in her eyes: sly, conniving, energetic. This only happens when she's outsmarted me and is off without a leash: FREEDOM, MY OWN MASTER!

It almost always ends badly.



The Childe Robin, snowbound

6 comments:

Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake said...

Sigh... you're making me so homesick! Just one more week, though, and I'll be home to visit for a bit.

Someday, God willing sooner rather than later, I'll be settling down among those hills myself.

Elephantschild said...

I was going to say how all homesick I am for Wisconsin and my equally homesick brother's beaten me to it.

May have to go for a drive through the Kettle Morraine just to stock up on "Wisconsiness."

Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake said...

Say, Bruce, you don't by chance have any neighbors looking to sell a few dozen acres, do ya?

Bruce Gee said...

I'm in Dane County, Evan. The cost of real estate here is probably the highest in the state.

I grew up in Sauk County, though. There might be some nice pieces of land up there in God's country.

You guys are in eastern Wisconsin aren't you? That is, when you "come home". We should try to rendezvous for lunch somewhere, sometime. How far from, say, Lake Mills would you be?

Bi-Coloured-Python-Rock-Snake said...

My dream property is somewhere in the rectangle of western WI bordered by the Wisconsin and Mississippi rivers and I-90, so Sauk's definitely a candidate. It's just such beautiful country out there.

We're about 2 hours from Lake Mills, but I'll be driving across the state on Jan 2nd headed up to MN, so it's barely out of my way to swing by anywhere in the greater Madison area.

Bruce Gee said...

Cool! I'm flying to NYC that day, but am free in the morning. I could drive out to the interstate to join you for breakfast. email me at hrtfurn@hughes.net; I'll send you my phone numbers.

B