Forty six degrees in the cabin this morning
Feet propped on the lip of the woodstove
Beanie, vest and Uggs keep me warm’¦enough
Fingers too cold to type
Heat a pot of water to dip my hands in every fifteen minutes or so
Thus baptized, the energy of life’”from flame to water to blood’”flushes through my body, my soul
I write
 
Yesterday no birds came to the feeders. I filled them all within an hour of our arrival. No sound or movement from humans has been in this part of the valley for a month; the feeders vacant and empty for more than a moon cycle. The avian inhabitants of the Yamsi Valley and Wild Horse Ridge had all afternoon to discover the refreshed largess but did not. I worry about them though I only know them as species: blue jay, mountain chickadee, and nuthatch. My concern is greater still for the three gray jays that I do know by name, the siblings that feed from my hands. Have I been away from ‘home’ too long?  Did they perish or move to some other part of the valley.
 
 Eleven degrees marks the outside low for the night. Cloud-filled skies that were not forecast kept away the minus temperatures I had expected. A smattering of disruptions in the cloud cover lets a slight, flamingo pink sunrise creep onto the horizon.  The sharp, frigid cold on top of last week’s rain created a crust of ice on top of the super dry snow beneath. It sounds like stepping on broken glass; a high, crisp shattering sort of ping with every step.  I walk the 50 meters to the outhouse and back: snap, crack, tinkle, and ping. I go to the river to wash my hands and face and greet the morning.  This task is aborted because the water below the dock morphed overnight to a solid sheet of ice. I am surprised because just eight hours ago, just before midnight, Bob and I washed our hands, arms, faces and necks in the river as a New Year’s Eve purifying ritual. We do this as a symbol of letting go of the year past, and to welcome the new with a clean, fresh body and mind. One year ago we did the same ritual, except we jumped full bodied into the river. It was too cold for total immersion last night. Our hands would have frozen to the iced-up metal posts of the ladder we use to climb in and out of the river.  Last night I was able to break through the crust of frozen water with my fists but this morning the ice had reformed and grown thick enough that I couldn’t punch my way through to the flowing, gray-green water below. I was too cold for the trying of it to get an ax and start over so I washed up in the cabin with a pot of warmed water.
 
Eight o’clock and the sun rose far to the south over the Long Bell. This is the name used by many in the area to identify the southern slope of Yamsi Mountain. It is a very long, gradual sweep from the summit of Yamsi to this end of the mountain, probably 25 miles. However, the Long Bell name comes from a timber company that used to own it. They logged the shit out of it and now thousands of acres of raped hillside are for sale. The sun came up this morning so near the end of this line’”far more southerly than easterly’”that it struck me hard when I realized that in just six months the sun will then rise near the farthest end of the North Slope of Yamsi. The Earth travels so fast around the sun, turning its axis to face more closely this brilliant star; I marvel at not feeling the movement of it beneath my feet. The North Slope ridgeline, that is the opposite support of Yamsi Mountain from the Long Bell, falls to the valley floor more precipitously. Still, it descends at a relatively gently pace as mountains go, sloping for nearly 10 miles before mountain becomes valley. Because of this gradual decline on its north and south ends, Yamsi gives the illusion of being nothing more than a tallish hill. In fact, Yamsi is Oregon’s highest volcanic peak of its kind east of the Cascade Range. Its summit tops out at 8,200 feet. This fact surprises most folks who ignore the mountain as being just another bump on the horizon. This is fine by me as it doesn’t attract attention and I can go on thinking of it as ‘my mountain’.
 
Within minutes of the sun’s breaching the horizon I hear the twit and twitter of birds; returned at last. How do they know there is now food here? Do they smell the seeds and suet, or hear the noise of humans and assume the feeders have been refilled? Or does one bird simply stumble upon the feast and broadcast through chirps and whistles, its discovery. Ten stellar jays now decorate the dying lodge pole pine in the front yard where a feeder hangs. They take turns trying to balance on the feeders posts designed for smaller creatures. A dozen nuthatches and chickadees vie for position as well.

 

They get their share and graze in the snow as well where leftovers are scattered by the clumsy blue jays. Not long afterward the distinct chirp of a gray jay catches my attention. I run outside, peanuts at the ready. Two jays sweep onto my outstretched hand and snip up a few nuts. Craws filled to bursting, they fly off to cache them at the base of a tree somewhere; then return. I worry for some time that one must have died since only two come back each time. Eventually, though all three gray jays’”Martie, Natalie & Emily’”perch on the log ends of the cabin or on the telephone wire, impatient with having to wait while I restock my hands. I’ll need to refill all three feeders in a few hours. Good thing I brought a fresh supply of peanuts from town so my friends won’t go hungry this week. 

 

The fire crackles in the stove; tea is steeping, scraps of blue sky peak through the clouds. What a joyous beginning of a new year.