on monday, i helped my dad shovel. it was seven degrees below zero and the wind chill factor made it much much colder, but i was bundled up and happy to be outside and moving.

usually, atlas calmly watches me shovel from the window. that day, he did not. he barked and barked and barked. i heard his (extremely loud) bark through the walls.

finally, i let him come outside. he ran around me a few times, nipped at my mitten, then went to the garage door. i brought him inside, then came back out to shovel.

i figured that was the end of it. he saw what i was doing; he remembered that he didn’t want to be outside; he would calmly watch or take a nap. but no, he barked and barked and barked some more.

later that day, something occurred to me.

when he barked, what if he was saying, “it’s too cold! come in! come in! come in!”

when he nipped at my mitten, what if he was trying to pull me inside.

oh, atlas. here you were trying to take care of me and keep me safe, and i didn’t even listen.

i am the oldest of eight, and most of my family lives in the midwest, so life here in michigan has been full of time with family.

games of yahtzee with my mom. games of rook with my mom and my grandparents. games of boggle with my mom and my sister. hikes with my dad. photo outings with my sister. sunday dinner at my parents’ house followed by games – usually with my parents, sister, grandparents, and brother & sister-in-law & nephew. playtime with my nephew. afternoons at my grandparents’ house – cleaning or putting up holiday garland or chatting while atlas snores on the couch. time with my brothers. two weeks of hugs and bubbles and books and “auntie nibby!” with savannah at christmas. a holiday full of family, food, games, and laughter. a kitty for atlas.

my mom is going to teach me how to bake bread and sew and quilt. my dad is teaching me about trees and showing me all the trails i missed when i was young.

there is lots and lots of time for conversation.

two years ago, i realized that one of the things that is most important to me is relationships.

at the time, i was thinking specifically about friendship, so i spent more time with the friends i already had and invested time and energy into making new ones.

but my family is incredibly important to me, and i am finding that this move i never expected to make is full of unexpected relationship blessings.

(my family plays games. i think i’ve played more games in the three months since i’ve been here than i’ve played in the entire 13 years i was away. in related news, my goal in life is to beat my sister at boggle. the last time we played, i think the score was 51 to 7.)

a threshold. a secret door. a swiftly tilting planet.

welcome to 2014!

may the new year bring you joy, pleasure, deep connection, a feeling of being held & supported, and a sense of your incredible being-ness.

in other news.

these photos were taken two days apart: december 30th and today.

i just can’t get over all the white.

i think we are on track for a record snowfall. there are snowbanks that are higher than my head. two days ago, there was probably a foot of snow on the ground by morning. i shoveled for my dad yesterday and it took me two hours.

you can tell that i am not jaded.

my two hours of shoveling felt like thirty minutes.

my dad and brothers did all the shoveling when i was growing up, and my dad still does all the shoveling. when i get the chance to shovel myself, it is a privilege and a pleasure and not a chore. (atlas watches me out the window and i wave at him every time i look in his direction. on zero degree days, he has no interest in joining me outdoors.) also, i find it very gratifying. i love straight lines and order and neatness.

what is your winter like?

i’d love to hear.

my mother asked me to decorate the table for thanksgiving.

all of my crafty supplies are in storage in oregon, and i didn’t want to buy anything, but on thanksgiving morning, i still hadn’t been inspired with an idea.

my mother offered me money to buy supplies, but i told her that sometimes it’s good to see how creative i can be using only what i have, so i took my pup for a snowy hike a few hours before dinner with the idea that i would forage for table settings and a centerpiece.

as we set out, i wondered if i could create place settings using wild apples.

on our walk, atlas stopped at a wild apple tree. there weren’t many apples left on the tree, and they were all soft and brown.

i continued on, feeling a little disappointed that the apple idea wouldn’t work out, when i happened to glance to the left. there, a little ways off the trail, was another apple tree. this one was much taller and the top was full of apples.

i tried to shake the tree. the apples wouldn’t fall.

i tried to use the dog leash to lasso the apples. the apples wouldn’t fall.

i was so disappointed. especially since i hadn’t been inspired with another idea.

just then, i happened to glance to the right and there was a long stick resting against another tree. the stick was the perfect height to reach the upper branches of the tree.

i used the stick to knock some apples down from the tree. they landed in the snow. when i dug them out, they were bright red and frosty and beautiful.

it felt like a beautiful gift (and a tiny answered prayer) from the wild world i love so very much.

(in the end, the apples were too frozen to use as place settings, so i placed them on cedar on a plate and it was perfect.)

i am currently making a christmas gift. or, i was, until i decided to light my candy cane candle. (it smells like a candy cane! it is quite possibly the best candle ever.) the flame and the smoke distracted me and i pulled out my camera.

when i went to the bathroom to douse the matches, i glanced out the window and saw a solitary brown oak leaf scampering across the snow-covered road. the leaf paused for a second when it got to the snowbank on the other side, but then it jumped over the snowbank and into the swamp.

a storm blew in on wednesday afternoon. fortunately, atlas and i went for a hike on tuesday and another hike on wednesday morning, because the gusty blustery biting wind is hard on atlas’s ears so we are now lying low. it is a little quieter today, but it is no less cold. i took atlas for a morning walk and when i glanced at him a short while after breakfast, i noticed that he was shivering. i settled him on the bed underneath two warm blankets and he is catching up on his sleep.

i will confess that i wondered how i’d survive winter. though i grew up here, i’ve been gone a long time, and i thought it might be too cold. but the cold must be in my blood, because i am here and it is less cold than i remember (by which i mean, my body has adjusted so now 30 here feels rather like 50 in portland) and i love it. also, i had forgotten one thing about this kind of winter, which is that the cold and the wind and the snow make me feel so alive.

wherever you are, i wish you warmth.

here, it is the night before thanksgiving.

as i write this, there is a candy cane candle burning and a puppy sleeping.

the snow has been falling softly all day and the world is covered in a fluffy blanket of white.

today included a snowy walk with the pup and games with my family. tomorrow, there will be turkey, for me and for atlas.

this thanksgiving, i am feeling grateful to be here, now. this year has been hard for me. one of my hardest years ever. but it has taught me (is teaching me) so very much.

here, all is well.

this thanksgiving, i wish you warmth, wonder, and a soft place to land if/when you need one. also flying puppy ears, because they make everything better.

atlas and i went for a hike that turned into an adventure!

when we turned off the gravel road and onto our trail, we found a puddle that still had ice around its edges. i took a shard of ice and wandered around, looking at bits of the world through my icy lens.

an evergreen. the sky. red berries. the sun.

when i was ready to turn away from my soft, muted, sparkling world, i offered the ice to atlas. he likes to eat ice and drink from puddles so it seemed like a double dose of pleasure.

when we left the trail and wandered into a field, we found a small grove of trees. they were dark grey and completely devoid of cover. aside from the rustle of dried leaves below our feet, the air was quiet and still and haunting.

just beyond the trees, there was a dark mound of something, so atlas and i went over to investigate.

the dark mound was felled trees. these trees looked like they had been pulled from the ground and loosely tossed into a pile. the tangled roots on the end of the nearest tree reminded me of an old man with a beard. i fully expected him to open his mouth and start speaking. (the old man wordlessly requested his privacy so there is no picture.)

when i looked to the left of the trees, i knew exactly what had happened. there was a large open pit in the ground. it was a giant sandbox!

atlas and i explored the sandbox for a while. it held rocks and sand and patches of snow and ice – and a tiny patch of flowers that resembled soft brown puffballs.

beyond the sandbox was a mountain, a mountain made of gravel. next to the gravel was a rusty turquoise excavator.

by this time, it was late afternoon, and dark comes early, so we turned toward the trail.

as we walked back, i watched the sentinels in the distance grow closer and closer and closer. it felt like they were circling us in protection and calling us home.

if growing up meant losing your ability to imagine, to play, to pretend, then i wouldn’t want to grow up at all.

fortunately for me, i know it doesn’t.

I take my phone and head out for a walk around the lake with the pup.

The air is cool. The wind is high. The sun is radiant.

The pup runs back and forth on the trail. He follows his nose into the woods here, up a hill there. Every so often, he comes to check on me. Every so often, he makes his way to the water for a long cool drink.

I see red, orange, yellow, green, brown. I hear a plop-plop-plop as turtles flop from their perch – tree roots that extend out into the water – into the lake. I smell autumn (I never know how to describe the smell of autumn, but the woods in autumn have their own particular smell). I taste the bitter-sweet flavor of vinegar-honey-water (my occasional breakfast drink) on my tongue. I feel the wild liveliness inspired by the chill and the trees as well as the playful curiosity that my camera inspires.

While I mean to walk around the lake, I find myself mesmerized by the leaves.

I sit or stand in front of first one tree, then another, then another. Watching, with camera and eye, the brisk lively dance of the leaves, the pause between each movement an adagio. Watching, with camera and eye, the play of the light as it sparkles and shimmers through the trees.

It is almost like nature is having one last glorious hurrah before the onset of winter.

As I sit, watching the leaves blow to and fro, I find myself wondering if the purpose of photography, of art, of any practice, is this: to slow us down enough to to see something, to really see something, like we are seeing it for the very first time; and to remind us that life is a collection of moments, and what seems like one small moment can be a glorious and exquisite gift.

Atlas is so happy here. Weimaraners were bred for hunting, so I imagine that for him, it’s like his essential nature gets to really come out and play. Finally. All his life, most of his walks have been on-leash. Now, the balance has shifted. He is a happy explorer and happy hunter and there are so many wild smells for him to smell. I could watch him all day.

Atlas does not, however, love campfires. This past weekend, we had a campfire, with s’mores and ghost stories. Where was Atlas, you might ask? In the car. He spent so much time hiding behind the picnic table that I finally opened the car door and let him in. We’ve been camping before, so I am not entirely sure what changed, but I am guessing it’s the smoke. I’ve had a few kitchen fiascos since our last camping expedition. Whenever Atlas caught a whiff of smoke, he would vanish upstairs and remain there until the smoke was long-gone.

Every time I leave Atlas with my mother, I come back to find that she has made him one happy happy dog while I was away. One time, she made him a pancake. Another time, it was a sausage. Another time, it was a pork chop. If it weren’t for the fact that I have fed him regularly for ten years – I am a proven food source – I think he might trade me in for this new model.

Atlas and Kia are still negotiating their relationship, but progress has definitely been made. At first, there was much hissing and hiding. Now, puppy and kitty can walk past each other, there is the occasional sniff, and once in a while, Kia will even tease Atlas. Kia is definitely the boss. Once, she was napping on the living room floor. Atlas walked in, laid on the floor near her, and jumped up almost instantly and walked away – it looked like he was so overwhelmed with nervous excitement that he couldn’t handle it.

Atlas has the wild, the kitty, meat, and a whole lot of love. In his world, all is well.