A Sepia Coloured Walk.

I went for a walk in the woods behind our house yesterday, it was just about 4 PM, close to twilight at this time of year. I had actually planned to just go up the road a little ways, i don't relish the idea of being in the woods once the sun sets, especially when the temperature is -16. Even though I have walked those paths for more than 20 years, it's still very easy (for me anyhow) to get turned around and lost.

I looked yearningly at the path that I usually take, it's a little bit off the beaten trail, and there was 3 or 4 inches of fresh snow, I could see that no one had walked there since the snow had fallen, and I like to be the first one to leave footsteps, it reminds me of a Currier & Ives card. So off I went.

The sky was dark gray, heavy with unfallen snow and as soon as I was beneath the trees the temperature dropped and it was a little darker. The trees were extremely laden with snow and all I could see was trunks and limbs in a dark shade of brown, and all the snow, one shade of white. Usually you can see green needles from the ponderosa pine and different colours of bark and branches, but I suppose the combination of dark sky, twilight and fresh snow gave it this sepia colour. I felt like I had quickly been transported back into an old photograph and I almost didn't want to look down for fear I'd find my feet encased in high black button boots and my hands tucked into a rabbit-fur muff. I have often thought that I belong in another time, but I didn't want to be there just then.

I walked a little further down the path and came into a bit of an open area where the light was brighter. I looked behind me and I could see the green needles of the trees and the red bear berries as vivid as drops of blood in the snow, no shades of sepia at all. I wondered if I had imagined it all, or maybe I walked into a little bit of the past.