It's snow time!

Deer leap through the snow near our house.

I've been pretty much paralyzed the last three days, ever since it started to snow. As you know if you regularly read this blog, our weather has been abnormally dry. Oregon's Cascade Mountains, though not as dry as California's Sierra Nevadas, had far too little snow, and the summer water situation was beginning to look grim.

No longer. Three days ago a series of storms swept in, bringing heavy snow to the mountains and even the Willamette Valley. In Sisters, it deposited three to four feet—it's difficult to be exact. All that snow was mesmerizing and magical, and we both had a hard time tearing ourselves away from the sight of thick snow pouring down hour after hour after hour. We watched as first one shrub and then another, and then small trees, disappeared under a graceful curve of white crystals.

The whiteness filled our winter-dark rooms with glowing light, and I want to thank whoever it was who designed snow to be white. It could have been made blue, or green, or even brown, I suppose, but someone had their thinking cap on and realized that during winter's darkest days a little reflected light off glistening white snow would be welcome. My little office is filled with light these days, making it a joy to enter.

The neighborhood from our front door.
You can see where we dug a path to the street Saturday morning.

Sisters is used to snow, but amounts like this are rare. We haven't been able to get around to see how the rest of the community is faring, but on our street at least, neighbors with shovels have been moving through the streets, helping one other shovel out paths and driveways. Not every one has been so lucky. The Nugget reports that an elderly couple was found dead in the snow, apparently trying to walk to a residence on an unplowed and "heavily blanketed" driveway. A sad note to an otherwise exciting few days.

This morning the storm moved on, the snow stopped, and the sun came out, producing a blinding and beautiful whiteness. And already, it's starting to melt. The pines, whose branches only a few hours ago held buckets of snow, are now almost bare. Beginning tomorrow at least five days of warming rain will arrive, and with it, chances of flooding.

Coincidentally, an article in today's New York Times titled "The End of Snow?" details the myriad places and ways that the white stuff is disappearing, thanks to climate change. It's depressing and frustrating that so little is being done, and if we could we'd happily share our abundance. Since we can't, we'll celebrate this bountiful gift by going for a walk, and by praying that the rains arrive slowly, enabling the melt to soak into the earth, not flood it.

This icicle over our back door eventually grew
to 42 inches before Ray knocked it down.

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A newsworthy autumn

Autumn was my favorite season until I got old enough to relate to it, now I prefer summers. But one can't deny that fall is generally lovely, and here in the high desert it's been glorious. The aspens and vine maples flash bright red and yellow in the sunshine and the bright leaves light secret paths through pine and fir forests. The Ponderosa pines (pondos to the locals) have dropped thousands of needles across our little yard, a fact I confess I find surprising. I knew needles fell, of course, but it never occurred to me that I might have to rake them.

The Harvest Faire was the big event of the season, with the Nugget reporting that it drew more than 180 artisans and crafts people from across the Pacific Northwest. We went, of course, and bought, of course—mostly gifts for the upcoming holidays. And although our neighbors raved about what a great market it was, I found it pretty much the same as all the others, only bigger. Sisters has more craft markets than any town we've ever lived in.

The Nugget, a weekly, is a surprisingly good paper for a town this small, and it's apparently healthy. Like papers of yore it's full of advertising, letters to the editor, and stories about local politics, people, schools, and events. Articles this week run the gamut from "Senator Wyden talks energy in Sisters" and the announcement of next year's rodeo queen, to a fascinating column by a local naturalist on horse flies, called "The blood suckers." The 32-page paper makes a positive contribution to the community, keeping us informed and providing a platform for discussion of local issues.

Good newspapers offer what the Internet cannot and I find it disturbing that so many have folded. It's a loss to readers and a blow to democracy, and it's a loss that contributes to the polarization we all feel. When we visit online sites that cater to our predisposed beliefs and bigotries, when we read only what we agree with, or limit our reading to our own narrow interests, we lose more than a better understanding of our world. We lose community, we lose the sharing of common knowledge and facts, and we lose a diversity of opinions against which to balance our own.

As I sit here in this bitter political season I am grateful for our local paper with its diverse opinions and for the community it helps sustain. Local elections and issues will be argued in its pages and politicians will buy ads. This is all good. And while the election plays out in the pages of the Nugget and in the bits and bytes of the Internet—and my blood pressure rises and falls in tune—I will find relief in gold and russet leaves and the wind-blown pondos outside my window. And if the tension gets really bad, I will go outside and rake.