Today my husband and I took a walk along Spring Creek. What a stark contrast from the turtles and ducks of summer! Instead, we enjoyed the bare trees, the water that rushed over rocks sounding distinctly icy rather than what sounds like singing in spring. I saw no speckled trout. I smelled no sweet flowers.
But I did see the wide sky, the tops of the rocky canyon, and the banks of the river that once hid under summertime foliage. I felt the cold. I noticed red berries and pinecones. We found large, hollowed out logs and wondered who would hibernate there.
I remember that you see differently in winter. You see things you can only see in winter when the cold strips the landscape bare. I know by now that God places us in colder, bleaker places because there’s something we can see only in those conditions. I love the creek in winter.