On folksinger, Jon McCutcheon’s album John McCutcheon’s Four Seasons: Wintersongs (paid link), there’s a lovely tune called Waiting for Snow. In some ways, that could be our homestead’s unofficial theme song lately.
Yesterday afternoon, while I finished up some firewood work Aly and I had been doing, Aly called me to the veranda, urging me to “come look!” I walked out and joined her in looking down channel. The sunny morning had gradually given way to high overcast. The wind generator blades had been still, facing north, all day. Lynn Canal had stood calm and smooth.
Now, a hard line of dark water had appeared to the south; beyond it, we could see white caps. Closer to us, the water remained smooth, but 3 foot swells began to splash against our rocks. Out of the sky, fine, feathery snowflakes began to drift down, teased by the first gusts of the coming wind. We stood together and watched the new weather sweep in upon us.
We’ve had less snow than usual this winter. We’ve accumulated little more than 6 inches at a time. That usually has melted or evaporated before the next snowfall.
We had planned for snow this winter. We have a couple piles of two-round logs piled around the property, waiting for a healthy snowfall, over which we’ll sledge the logs home with our pulk. We also like to snowshoe, and have been anticipating that activity. So far, we’ve carried our snowshoes out with us once, just in case, but ended up caching them halfway on the trail, to pick up and haul home when we returned.
Maybe this time it’ll be different. The weather forecast includes a winter storm warning. It cautions that we could accumulate an inch of snow per hour tomorrow, with an expected total between 8 and 14 inches.
This would actually be good news for us, but we’ll have to wait and see. The forecast is for Haines, which sits at the junction of Lynn Canal and the Chilkat River Valley. When those two air masses meet, snow or rain often results in heavier falls than we usually see here.
However, this might be different. Juneau, to our south, is under the same warning. Maybe we’ll get something we can work . . . and play with, this time?