Coming home yesterday I was surprised by a large set of tracks coming from the mountain, crossing my driveway, and continuing downhill. I presumed they belonged to a man, but I had never seen human tracks on my property before, and hunting season is over. The person apparently was out for secrecy too, because instead of taking an easy route through the fields he took a wooded route equidistant from the two houses in the area. I was curious, and figured I’d follow the trail later to find out who it was.
Today I took a closer look, and was even more surprised than I thought I’d be. I followed the trail downhill (the picture shows the original tracks on the right, and mine (which go in both directions, as I walked on my own track) on the left). In places where the tracks had been protected from the wind, I could see toemarks! The tracks appeared to be too circular – human feet are of course quite oblong. And no evidence of boots anywhere. It was hard to make a definite identification – the wind had played with the tracks, there was also a coyote who followed the track and contributed his own toeprints – but I think it was the bear. He also followed almost precisely his traditional trail – the bearpath that runs right throught my property. But what is a bear doing going for a stroll in mid January? Tomorrow I plan to pack a lunch and go follow the tracks. If they lead to a house, we know they’re human. And if this is my last post ever, follow the bear tracks up the mountain, and where you find the red snow, put a lily where I met my untimely end.
Click for a closer look.
There’s a light, powdery snow on the ground , and a tiny animal like a mouse has to push his way through it, rather than walk on top of it. The result are some fabulous tracks. What’s it like to be inside that little brain, going around in circles like that? Probably not that different, actually.
… for a stroll on a winter morning.
The ever-tame Wildcat Mountain deer.
On New Year’s Day, I listened to the Woodstock radio station WDST, which is just about the only independent radio station I’ve ever heard. They had their “top 100 songs of the decade.” Apparently this list was determined by listener vote in some way or other. The list is so idiosyncratic it reads like a single individual’s list. I had never even heard of Franti – who apparently had the fourth-best song of the decade Woodstockwise – though I do know the three spots above Franti (U2, Coldplay, Bruce Springsteen). WDST’s format is basically “Woodstock Music of Today” – anything any of the old 60s guys do (especially Bob Dylan) and anything that sounds more or less compatible with that. But it’s odd to see Robert Plant sharing space with Outkast as having some of the best songs of the last decade.
Top discovery from listening: the Plant/Krauss collaboration, including “Please Read the Letter.” The Lucinda Williams song “Righteously” brought back some good memories of living in Woodstock in 2003.
Warmer weather today. In the 20s, and the wind almost entirely stopped. Carolina Blue skies too – really just a lovely day. Three coyotes swung by last night, one crossing right in front of the house. The deer have fallen into a pattern the past few days, taking a trail that crosses by the stream.
I did a few practical things, cleaning all my pots, then scrubbing the stovetop and the kitchen counter. It was a nice day to be working with water warmed by the wood stove. Outside I was able to de-ice the waste line from my toilet, running warm water through the line, then detaching the pipe and knocking the ice off. Not terrible work – in weather below freezing there is no smell. And quite timely – going into January with no ice built up at all is quite good.
Coming home yesterday I was surprised by a large set of tracks coming from the mountain, crossing my driveway, and continuing downhill. I presumed they belonged to a man, but I had never seen human tracks on my property before, and hunting season is over. The person apparently was out for secrecy too, because instead of taking an easy route through the fields he took a wooded route equidistant from the two houses in the area. I was curious, and figured I’d follow the trail later to find out who it was.
New Content for the Internet.
11-Jan-10I had the pleasure of going over the Hamilton Fish Bridge on I-84 twice today (that’s the (Hamilton Fish) Bridge, not the Hamilton (Fish Bridge), by the way). It’s named for one of the Hamilton Fishes, a family of New York politicians. There were several of the name, and like Roman Marcus Claudius Marcelluses or Publius Cornelius Scipios it’s not easy to tell them apart. But the following was said about one of them, that “He sometimes chipped the cube of Truth, to make it roll.” I think about it every time I cross that bridge, and always with a smile. I presume that it refers to the one the bridge is named after, because such a quality would tend, I think, to make a man successful. It’s a quality that gets bridges named after you.
Amazingly, I could not find that phrase on the internet. I might just be adding new content here.