Every year about this time my house falls under siege to a naval blockade on the lake out back.  The first flotilla comes in on a cold midnight as the water begins to gel and stiffen.  If there is a moon, I watch the shadows gather until by dawn the whole armada is there – ducks and geese together like flagships with escorts.  There is something about the water directly behind my house that makes it freeze last, and so for days, as the temperature seesaws, I have a feathered lagoon of open water where scores of birds entertain me with their layovers on the way south.  Their urgent choruses beckon some chord out of my humanness that we have in common, though I don’t know what it is – flight? freedom? the limberlost sound of searching for your true home, a place where all that is in your nature is met?  I am humbled by being allowed to witness this.  I have done nothing to deserve such a vantage point in their world.  And when they lift off in a fever pitch of excitement, I will inherit tranquility again.

But of all the superb celestial events I see from my windows, the winter sunsets are the most spectacular.  Salmon pinks invest the ice and snow on the lake in fantastic patterns.  It is as though the water is made of sky.  The horizon itself burns down and resurrects itself at will, just to upstage rainbows.  The cries of the loons and the geese are surely for pure joy.  And the dawns run a close second to the dusks.  At first light a few days ago I saw that the waxing and waning of new winter’s ice had formed an archipelago and hundreds of water fowl were resting in a long ragged line that gerrymandered the frozen bridges (see picture below).  With each new raft of arriving birds, a frenzied song came down as if from loudspeakers.  It was like a cross between Woodstock and Chairman Mao’s Long March.  

But, hey, I’m saving the best for last.  Because we got socked with two snowstorms in one week.  Spent both of them driving around all night, surveying Christmas lights, doing 360’s in parking lots, playing dodg’em with snow plows and snowmobiles.  The big question, however, was whether or not I would be able to ski.  Bear in mind that the orthopods said that my four carp ‘n’ tuna ops would likely leave my hands weak for a year if not permanently, my hamstring would take 10 months to heal, my other knee had chipped cartilage, and my torn shoulder muscle would take 3-6 months to mend.  Happy to say, all that was greatly exaggerated.  I threw away their tepid exercises and jumped (figuratively speaking) back into the pool.  With a pull buoy between the knees, it was still possible to pull with one arm and feather the torn one underwater.  In 10 days I was starting to recover the torn shoulder over the water for a few strokes each length breathing to that side, and a couple weeks later was pulling a mile free every day at a decent pace.  But the skiing was a big question mark, and skiing is necessary for my total well-being and healing.  Pointless fear.  All is extremely well with the body.  By day and evening I skinny-ski to my heart’s content.  No, skinny-skiing isn’t skiing naked, as my best friend once asked – unless by that you mean with an exposed soul.  Because I do have that.  Alone out on the trails gives me incalculable pleasure and makes me feel guilty for not sharing it.  My soul quakes with gratitude to have such opportunities.  And that first adventure back in the woods was magical!  Even the chipped cartilage seems somehow to have regenerated, owing to something called Synvisc.  I am newborn!  Now for the heart, mind and soul...

Age has always been just numbers to me, but I credit my hero with showing me the way to earthly immortality.  “Jackrabbit” Johannsen, who left Madison Avenue at age 56, became a legend among the Cree Indians, whom he taught to ski, then married an Indian woman and fathered 5 children and died at 112 – still on skis.  If another Minnesotan, U.S. Supreme Court Justice William O. Douglas, at age 67 can marry a 23-year old law student and live happily ever after, and Walter Stack can run 50-mile marathons in his 70s, and up Pike’s Peak at age 81, I’m not going to let a few muscle pulls slow me down while I’m still wearing stuff I wore in high school (man, I am seriously out of fashion).  I believe I have the edge on them for holistic motives.  In fact, this month’s column over on StorytellersUnplugged.com kind of deals with the holistic approach.   Here’s the link:  SU 12-16-07 » THOMAS SULLIVAN: DREAMING DREAMS YOU NEVER DARED TO DREAM BEFORE, THE X FACTOR, AND KEEPING THE FAITH

Since I started this newsletter by writing about birds, I shouldn’t leave out the crazy cardinal, should I?  Begin with a Christmas hunt that dominated all last week.  Call it the search for a Blue Light Special.  No, not K Mart’s.  This was for some deeply blue-violet Christmas lights I’d glimpsed one night.  Was about to give up when, lo and behold, I saw some during my nocturnal wanderings.  They were decorating the window of a plumbing shop in a small town named St. Michael.  Took the number, called the next day, and got a lead which led me on another late night journey where the prize was secured (see photo below).  Bought 8 sets and arranged them with white mini-light crests, but now a male cardinal is eating the bulbs.  I don’t know what his story is, but he won’t stop.  He only does this when they are off, and I can’t bring myself to spice his diet by throwing the electric switch while he’s dining.  Hey, it’s just a “light” meal.  …  Alas, missed writer Flamingo Frank’s Christmas bash in Clarkston, Michigan this year, but it couldn’t be helped.  Had intended on taking a photo of Frank drinking spiked cider from a beer mug and posting it here, captioned “Frank ‘n’ stein.”  Ah, well, working on next year.

And here’s a hysterical little link from me to you for Season’s Greetings, the result of Mark Manrique’s latest craze.  I’ve been “elfed” and “re-elfed.”  It’s beyond embarrassment.  You just have to laugh at yourself when it gets this ridiculous.  If the link doesn’t open when you click it, right click and choose Open Hyperlink: http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1230300475   The photos below include 2 by Dr. Foto Manrique (Hillbilly & ET), plus 2 others I took skiing at Elm Creek, another of the blue-violet Christmas lights, and one of the long queue of water fowl behind my house.

Thanks for reading. Your thoughts are welcome, your attention valued.  Older newsletters will now be archived on the website, but unfortunately we can only include new photos with the e-mailed version.  If you’re not getting this free monthly newsletter mailed to you and would like to receive it, including photos, ask to be added to the list at: mn333mn@earthlink.net  And if you’d like to see more of my latest writing, please check out a free sample chapter from THE WATER WOLF on my website.

Take care,

Sully

www.thomassullivanauthor.com