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The Frozen North: Spring Melt

by janra
Posted to Diaries, Diary on Fri May 12, 2006 at 04:20:36 PM PST
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Snow falls, but rarely vertically. The wind sculpts drifts, layering their structure and leaving a record of the winter. Here was a sunny day, where the drift got an ice shell. There, gale-force winds, polishing the surface into hard-packed ridges.

Snow boulders expose their sedimentary layers, the sun and wind and bare ground an archaeologist slowly chipping away, exposing the history of the past winter.

In a month, that history will be gone, erased except for the raw stuff of this year's record in the places that never melt. Some day, the sun and wind will erase even that history.

There are footprints passing over a snow dune, heading toward the pond. They are indistinct, yet firm. The sun saw them before the blizzard, and the wind polished the snow off the dented hardpacked surface. Before long, the footprints will be in the pond, as will all of the landscape on this side of the dike, and the summer world will reappear.

Flash floods are redirected; where they win, the miners are redirected. The road becomes a maze of potholes and muddy lakes, and equipment that mere days ago was scrambling to get snow off the road is now trying to fill potholes with mud. Our pond surges in size - a vertical meter, two. We have the room, and the snowmelt is welcome. The pond will be empty again come autumn.