Mid-Winter can be a psychologically trying time. Maybe it is an ancestral memory of the hardships endured as the cold’s icy grip seems only to tighten – starvation, discomfort, disease. Maybe it is because the shortened days have begun to seem interminable and that longing for warmth, for air that doesn’t bite at the skin will remain unsatisfied for many, many days. Maybe it is a reflection of nature’s reality in ourselves. Dormant vegetation, absence of bird, frog and insect song. Regardless of the reason, it can feel like a never ending undeserved punishment for those whose eyes are not open or (as was my case) have simply forgotten to look for the evidence of God’s glory and of His promise that surround us even in the bleakest of times.
I had been driving home from checking empty traps. The pre-dawn morning had been bitter cold and sunrise greeted me with heavy cloud cover which lent a grey, sunless aspect to all the world. Sleeping corn and bean fields awash with dirty snow provided the scenery for my drive, hardly inspiring. Not even a crow was to be seen hunting the road shoulders for frozen roadkill, even they were smart enough to be holed up somewhere with family or friends rather than cold, alone and defeated on a windswept February concession road.
Somewhere along the way, the sun decided it had suffered enough of the clouds’ tyranny and burst forth in a blaze of light, snapping the blurry outlines of everything into surreal, sharp clarity. It was then that I noticed her.
Halfway across a 100 acre parcel, a sorry little woodlot stood. As is usual here, it was a mix of predominantly poplar, maple and beetle killed ash trees. Muted grey and naked they stood, the partially debarked ash trees like sad, broken teeth scattered amongst ancient bones in desert of snow, dust, bean duff and ice. But a gleam of perfect, opalescent brightness, a color that was not the stark white of the snow, not the dull grey of the surrounding trees, but white nonetheless. A beech tree of unusual size towered among them, her widespread canopy providing a lovely contrast to the lance like aspect of the poplars and dead ash trees all around her. And I was struck by her beauty.
She seemed to glisten as a new bride to the world. So full of potential, so full of barely restrained life seeking to leap out at the first signs of more agreeable weather. She was as perfect as a thing could get, unique in an ocean of mediocre sameness. It was as though a pinprick in the veil between this fallen kingdom and God’s perfect creation had allowed a momentary glimpse into Heaven and the waters of my mind were stilled.
In the coming days, leaf buds appeared on bare branches, snowdrops would flower in areas that were warmed in daylight and winter’s chains were breaking. Sometimes, in the darkest, deadest days of Winter I drive past that area on purpose now and she remains a steadfast jewel in the center of that small forest, unnoticed by the hundreds of people who drive past every day, alone in their misery. I am forever thankful that she was revealed to me.
