The outside light captured the delicate white flakes in flight as the year's first gentle snow cascaded down upon the leaf covered ground. The worn, earthen path that wound through the dense growth of pine and oak on its way toward the rippling creek was almost covered by the time he became aware of the change in weather.

As he peered through the panes of the rear door toward the gentle scene that developed in front of him, the sound of the nearby creek seemed unusually cold. Even though the fire was dying down in the old metal wood stove in the middle of the one room cabin, the remaining warmth of the room embraced him, giving a feeling of security and rare contentment.

The cabin was his special hide-away, the place where he could escape into himself, and, at times, completely away from reality. This place was where he wrote when he felt compelled to write, where he went to read when he felt the need for books, where he went to think when he wanted no interruption, where he went to dream when he wanted to give no justification. There were no questions demanding answers here. The cabin had become his quiet place where life, for all that it had become, could be faced or ignored.

The icicles that hung from the roof in front of the outside light fixture dropped shadows onto the now almost totally white ground. Water in the bird bath near the outside table had been frozen for days and now was the perfect receptacle for the fine white powder that collected there.

The hardwood floor was getting colder to his bare feet and he walked back toward the middle of the room and stood on the Indian rug that covered the area between the soft sofa and the stove. Several pieces of split, seasoned oak wood were in the large black bucket by the sofa and he gathered up one of the largest and held it against his left leg as he bent over and opened the stove's front door. A small fire flickered from the remains of the night's earlier feeding as he carefully positioned the new firewood inside, on top of the fire and the hot bed of coals that lay beneath. He watched for a few seconds until the new log ignited on its innermost end, then he closed the stove door and looked over on the couch for the blue sweater he had pulled off only two hours before. The northerly wind that accompanied the snow, while not fierce, caused a slight draft in the room.

The walls of the cabin were adorned with Native American artifacts and art that he had collected through the years. His favorite painting, a large oil depicting a Plains Indian village near a small river, occupied a prominent place on the main wall in front of the sofa.
An avid history buff of Native American culture, the painting always brought to his mind the senseless slaughter of women, children and the elderly during the early morning hours of slumber by a cruel and greedy white army. The shame of it all. Mankind's attempt to eradicate an entire race of people...for reasons incomprehensible and never justifiable.

Near the front door was a small print of an Indian shield, peace pipe and pottery that carried the printing of a Cherokee blessing: "May the warm winds of heaven blow softly upon this home and the Great Spirit bless all who enter here." It had been placed there with good purpose, even though it had been many months since a visitor had been inside the cabin.

His hair, the same hair whose length had once mirrored his conservative upbringing, was now long and gray and blended in with the beard. The hair, the beard, his general appearance spoke his soul, he thought. At least to him it reflected the way he now felt about life. The old indian custom was the opposite, he knew. In times of mourning, the indian would cut his hair to show all his pain. Johathan Daniels' hair had always been short by societal demand. Now, he chose to let it grow and grow and grow.

Now fifty, he found himself wondering if he was old or young. Sometimes he felt as if he was both. Under certain circumstances he felt he was too old to be young. and then at other times he sensed that he was too young to be old.

He loved snow, especially the first snowfall of the year. He had not always lived where snow fell, and during the last several years had relished being located near Ashville, North Carolina, where the year had seasons, where nature's changes seemed to mark the passage of human existence. The first snow always was purifying and cleansing, covering the end of one stage with apparent new beginnings.

Throughout the years, Jonathan Daniels had assembled on his word processor a collection of his favorite poetry. He would read something in a poetry journal or a small inconspicuous literary magazine that touched his heart, or sparked a memory, or just otherwise pleased his taste and he would type it into his special collection. Periodically he would print the selections on a special parchment paper and insert them into a three-ring binder with all the others. It was his one-of-a-kind book, in which he had been the lone editor, publisher, reader, enjoyer.

He spied the binder on the wall shelf near his computer desk and retrieved it. The first snow reminded him of one of the earlier contributions to his poetry project. The first snow always reminded him of this poem. He had never heard of Hayden Carruth before he ran across the poem in a copy of a national poetry review. Now the man was one of his favorite poets. The poem was reprinted from The Sewanee Review, though Jonathan had little idea where that publication originated, but that really didn't matter.

What mattered was that Hayden Carruth was also an older writer, and one who shared his insights and emotions, one who seemed to understand what it meant to no longer be young. Carruth had been born and raised in rural Connecticut and later lived in northern Vermont before moving to upstate New York. Carruth had taught graduate creative writing and had published more than twenty books. Jonathan respected this writer, and sat back into the soft sofa as the snow continued to fall, and turned to his favorite Carruth poem.

 

Sex

By Hayden Carruth

On the first few nights of the new year, a week
ago, we had a full moon or near it in central
New York and the air was cold, the snow frozen,
metallic, and bright. On the steep field
the stream of moonlight flowed down from the crest
of the hill to the little house. A frozen stream,
he thought---the man I am always writing about.
But when he looked more closely he saw, or
thought he saw, the molecules of light flowing
both ways in scarcely discernible swiftness,
down to him, up to the moon, reflected glints
in a flux of passionate intensity in a pure
world, a simple world, his peaceful valley. He was
thinking about sex. He was thinking especially
of last night when he had been in bed with the
young woman he called conventionally, as people
do, his, and he had been saddened. Aging men
suffer two kinds of impotence, the ordinary
kind that everyone makes jokes about, and then
the deeper psychic failure when they are full
of eros, but it is hidden, too remote
to evoke the wonder of lust in their partners.
So it had been, and then afterward they lay
looking out at the moontrack in the snow.
Now he is alone in his house with his gray
neutered cat Pokey. In former times women
who would not heat up were made into slaves,
and when too many slaves encumbered the
polity, these women were lowered into
wells until they drowned. Nor was this some
stewpot of Asian hillbillies in the National
Geographic, but in Europe, a nation I do not care
to name. Pokey, on the table next to the Christmas
cactus, was looking out the glass door, staring
at the moontrack with his yellow eyes immense,
unmoving, until the spell was broken and he
glided down like a shadow and went into the kitchen
where he fizzed the litter in his box. Is it
that aging people live in an assortment
of remnants, impulses too worn, desires
too flaccid to function any more? The man
felt all his love gathering outside him, a power
with no bodily counterpart, out there in the
deathly cold, in the ghostly light, as if
the beautiful young woman in her nakedness
were a circumstance of the night, seen
in the time of unseeing. For many moments
he looked out at the moon and the moonflow,
at the dark woods on either side, at the frozen
snow, until finally he too went into the shabby
kitchen and opened the door of an upper cabinet,
and took down a jar of peanut butter. Death
may come in many forms, they say, but truly
it comes in only one, which is the end of love.
The clock on the big oaken bookcase, still running
after sixty-nine years, strikes one in the morning,
a clanking tone, ice falls from the eaves---changes
in the night. The cat rubs against the man's legs.

from The Sewanee Review

Carruth's writings had such familiarity to them.

"Damn, I love that poem," he muttered quietly to himself. He closed the binder, sat it on the floor in front of the sofa, and slowly rose. He walked to the light switch near the front door and turned off the light, then returned to his comfortable seat on the sofa in front of the wood burning stove.

It was an old stove, and in the darkened room he caught glimpes of the growing flame through the crack spaces where the sides joined together. The room was getting warmer now...comfortable in a way only a wood fire can occasion.

From his vantage point on the sofa, he could still see the flakes, illuminated surrealistically by the outside light on a dark night background, gently falling outside. The CD of mellow New Age guitar music had been playing on repeat for some time now, but only in this cozy darkness did he start to hear it. It dawned on him that he had subconsciously put it on earlier to feed his depression. It had achieved that effect and the melancholy mood began to surround him like a persistent cloud, in a sense unwanted, but invited just the same. He often wondered about this strange nature of his and why, at times, he sought out the sadness.

He hated being alone. He hated himself for allowing himself to be so. Yet this was part of the suffering that had become his life.

When the telephone rang, he started not to answer it. The pervasive ringing had shattered his darkened state. But it continued its persistent invasion and he finally lifted it off the hook.

"Hello," he answered, his voice sounding almost as if he had just awakened from a deep sleep.

"You sound tired. Are you alright?" she asked. Her soft voice reflected a concern that he still didn't fully understand but had come to appreciate.

***

Linda had become a special friend during the past few months. He knew she cared for him, though not fully just how much or even why. He was not always good company...for her...for anyone for that matter. Yet she still came around and obviously had some feelings for him.

It had been difficult letting her get close. His wife's death two years earlier had left him shattered, distant and resentful. For a long time he avoided people, especially old friends. Solitude had become the only companion he sought...the only state in which he found any consolation.

Linda had been the first to penetrate that retreat and she had done so simply by just being there when he first allowed himself to talk about the pain. They had been co-workers for several years and her compassion during the time of Mary's illness had been sincere. He knew that for certain. He could see, even then in her eyes that there was true concern for him. But during the final days of the illness, Linda, like most of his other professional friends, had kept her distance...obviously not knowing what to do or what to say. After Mary's death, they had all tried to cheer him, but the distance was still there even then.

In early October, before the cold winds arrived and almost eighteen months to the day since Mary's passing, he asked Linda to go to lunch. He felt so awkward that first time they went out. He had been married to a woman he loved and cherished for many, many years, and it seemed so terribly strange to be sitting in a restaurant with someone else, looking at this different person across the table, carrying on conversation, occasionally laughing, attempting to be normal.

But it was so hard being normal again. The sadness that he carried with him was his attempt to keep Mary in his life. When he hurt, when the pain went to the very depths of his soul, when the tears welled in his eyes at night as he reached across the bed and found it empty, he knew his entire being was with Mary. He did not want to turn her loose. He did not want to admit that she was no longer a part of his life.

When the loneliness became oppressive, he often went to her dresser and gently took out some of her clothes. As he brought them to his face, he could smell her so clearly. He found that if he closed his eyes, cleared his mind, and gently applied pressure with his fingers, among the white radiance that emitted from his eyes was the image of her.

By late October, about the time of the first freeze, he and Linda had started to become comfortable with each other's company. She invited him to her home one evening for a home cooked meal. At first he was reluctant to accept the invitation. It didn't seem right yet, for him to do such a thing. In a way, he still felt married and this brought with it guilt about being with another woman, especially in the place where she lives.

But that evening with Linda had been the exact opposite of what he had expected. Her home was warm and peaceful and full of the little things that only a woman's touch can cause. Objects throughout the place were arranged in that special little order that men can never truly understand, much less accomplish, though they may try at times. And there was also the smells of a woman there. The pleasant talcum aroma in the bathroom...the perfume of cleanliness. The smell in the kitchen of good food being prepared there flooded his mind with not so distant memories.

It was in her living room, after a most delicious meal of his favorite steak and potatoes, green beans and homemade rolls with melted butter, topped off with a large glass of cold milk, that he broke down and the tears, the real ones from deep down inside, finally came forth and began to wash away, no, only begin to erode away the hurt he had carried since that black day of her death. His embarrassment was monumental. It had come on him so unexpectedly. Here he was, with a woman he knew not that well, and he was, he knew, pathetic. Yet, he could not stop crying.

There were no words spoken between them during this long moment. There were no words, no real words, for either to say. But there was an understanding, bridged by compassion, displayed by Linda that night that would stay with him forever. She had come to him, close and caring, and captured him up into her arms and held him tightly throughout the silence. Occasionally one of her tears would mingle with his as she shared his grief. It was this time in the depths of his worst despair that the special bond between them was born.

***

"What's wrong, John?" she asked after an especially long silence.

"I'm just in one of my funks again," he replied, his voice revealing his state of mind. "You know how I get sometimes. It's just one of those nights."

"I just called to see if you knew it was snowing," she explained. "I know you've been looking forward to the first snow."

"Yea," he responded. "A few minutes ago, I stood looking out the back door at the ground slowing covering. With the light and the darkened woods in the background, and the sound of the creek, it was most wonderful, Linda. For a minute there, I felt real peaceful, if you know what I mean?"

"I had a feeling that you knew the snow had come...but I just wanted to be sure."

"I'm glad you called. Your voice is most welcome at this instant. I'm sitting here in the dark in front of an old wood stove, with a roaring fire that is just about too hot right now, and I can't think of anyone I would rather be talking to right now than you."

A noticeable silence lingered in the air for a few seconds longer than normal.

"Do you have any plans this weekend," she asked, a slight tone of insecurity in her soft voice.

"I have none," he responded. "And you?"

"No. My kids were going to drive up tonight for the weekend, but the weather changed their minds."

The same awkward silence returned, but this time it seemed to last a little longer.

"Linda, the roads aren't bad yet. Would you drive out to the cabin and join me in front of the fire?" There was a nervousness to his tone, as this unexpected question came from him. She sensed it and responded only after some hesitation.

"I can come out for awhile, I guess. Can I bring anything?"

"Just yourself..." he responded.

A few comments later the conversation ended and he found himself again alone in front of the stove, on a dark winter night with the first snow falling gently outside. Now his thoughts had shifted to her, and for awhile the depression went into hiding.

***

He and Linda had been out together several times since that first luncheon in early October. On two occasions they had kissed. The first time was a simple kiss at parting one evening when he had dropped her off at her home. The last time was on his third visit to her home and followed an evening in which they talked about their desires for the future and dreams and loneliness and the difficulties of finding another person in middle age. It was then she told him she had been thinking more and more about him...that she had started to feel feelings toward him that she had not known for a long time.

Sitting close together talking on her sofa, their hands had somehow managed to find one another. That first touch had warmed him deeply and he deliberately checked his thoughts, forcing a memory that could be easily recalled. As she gently stroked his hand, he realized just how much he had missed being touched. The thrill it brought was almost childish.

Intimacy had been something he had deliberately avoided. Yet, here in the darkened cabin, on this cold night, he felt himself becoming aroused at the thought of her coming to him here. For the first time, he allowed the fantasy of another woman in his life. He envisioned her being submissive and passionate to his touch. In his mind, he sensed the deep kissing, the feel of her nakedness, the warmth of her body against his. He closed his eyes and saw them embraced in love making, joined together in stillness, feeling the union, the quiver of anticipation, the totalness that comes from within. In the fantasy she wanted him as much as he wanted her. In the fantasy he was loved again.

For the thirty minutes it took her to drive there, Jonathan Daniels played the intimacy of their naked sharing over and over in his mind and with its performance came a mellowness to his being. The sharp edges of the past were being dulled by new desires that stirred within him.

He heard the soft tapping on the door and hurried up to let her in from the cold. She brought a bottle of muscadine wine and left it sitting just outside the door on the front porch to cool in the night air.

***

He was extremely nervous as they sat down together on the sofa in front of the old stove. The room was still dark, he realized now, but she had not mentioned it. He noticed she was sitting very close to him, their legs touching as they both seemed caught up in the moment. There was silence for a few moments as they settled in.

"Isn't it beautiful how you can see the flames through the corners of the stove there?" she asked, breaking the silence between them.

"Oh, yes. It hypnotizes me sometimes, just sitting here staring at it in the darkness," he responded. "And speaking of darkness. Maybe I should turn on some lights. I'm sorry. I've been sitting here like this for so long, I really didn't even think about it when you came in."

"Oh, no, please don't. This is really great. Snow falling, a warm cabin, a cozy fire. What more could anyone want?"

"Did you have any trouble finding the place?" he asked.

"No, none. When you drove me up here week before last, I made a mental note of that unusual mailbox on the road where you turned off. It was no problem."

"I was afraid you may have had some trouble finding it in the dark."

"No, it was ok."

He got up and placed a medium piece of wood in the stove. When he opened the stove door, the fire inside lit the room with a mellow, flickering light.

"I love your place here, John. It's very cozy," she commented as she quickly looked around at the walls and the objects that could be seen in the temporary light.

"Linda, this place has been a real comfort to me in the last few months. It has given me somewhere to go when I need to get away for awhile."

"The tone of your voice concerned me earlier on the phone. Are you really doing ok?"

"I had just let my mind wander again. I don't know why I do that. I should be learning by now that depression is the worse when it is deliberately sought out. But, you know me...I still do it, in spite of what I know is best. A glutton for punishment, I guess."

"It just takes time, John. You are not going to get over this all at once. You know that. But it'll happen with time."

"So I've been told." He forced a smile in the almost totally darkened room. "But enough of that for now. I want you to know that I really appreciate you coming out. There is something about you that tends to lighten my thoughts."

Indeed that was the truth. He had found himself in recent days looking forward to seeing her each day. Often he would later think of things they talked about, the little things that had only a short time before been inconsequential. There was a common ground they shared. Her life's sorrow had been a bitter divorce after many years, an experience which had hurt her as much as Mary's death had hurt him. She understood the difficulties of adjustment to loneliness. She knew what his sadness was about and how deep his pain went. He knew the compassion she displayed toward him was genuine.

In the darkness he felt her hand find his and clasp it tightly, then release the pressure to lightly hold it in hers. She rubbed his fingers with hers in a gentle, circular motion. The growing warmth of the fire and closeness of this woman next to him brought over him a calm such that he had never felt before in quite the same way. He felt like a character in a movie and for some strange reason, he thought of Henry Fonda and Katherine Hepburn in "On Golden Pond" when Henry asked his wife of many years if she wanted to act like a kid and "suck face." Jonathan chuckled to himself.

"What are you thinking," she asked, probing the cause of his humor.

"You wouldn't believe it," he replied. "Did you ever see 'On Golden Pond?'"

"Yes, but that's sure been a long time ago."

"Do you remember the line when Henry Fonda asked Hepburn if she wanted to 'suck face?'"

"Yea, I sure do. What made you think of that?"

"God knows," he responded. "Maybe its the cabin and the two of us being here together. I don't know."

"Do you recall the sound of the loons at the lake?" she asked.

"Wasn't that wonderful," John answered. "I don't remember where they filmed that movie, but the scenery...God, that scenery was awesome. The lake, the woods. Their cabin was a lot larger than mine, I'm sure you've noticed. But, you know, I used to have a wooden boat almost like the one he had in that movie. I loved that boat like it was a member of the family. Wooden boats are special. They require a lot of care."

"What happened to it?" she wondered.

"I finally sold it to a younger man when it developed some dry rot after being out of the water all winter. Old wooden boats need younger men to maintain them as they age."

"Do you miss it?"

"You know I do. But it brought me a lot of joy."

"Maybe you need to get another boat. Maybe you need that now."

"I may get another one sometime. I've thought about it, but its hard finding a boat with that type of character."

"That was a good movie, wasn't it?"

"One of the best ones I have ever seen and by far Henry Fonda's best work. You know, now that I think of it, that movie was the first one I ever saw on a video recorder. We went over to a friend's home to view it. I remember the emotions I felt when I saw the movie. It really touched me."

He paused for few seconds, allowing his thoughts to form into words. "It was when my heart problems were first beginning and the doctor was hinting that I would probably one day have to have surgery. Deep down I didn't think I had long to live. That movie brought home to me just how precious life is. It especially impressed upon me the need to show my daughter just how much and how deeply I loved her. I thought Fonda's relationship with his daughter was so sad."

"I thought it was too," she agreed. "My father and I were always so close. It was a different story with my mother, but my dad always tried to make up for that. I'm planning on flying home this Christmas and spending at least a week with him. His age is really starting to show. He doesn't remember quite like he used to. He gets real impatient with himself. I'm lucky that my sister lives close to him and can keep tabs on him. But he and I talk at least a couple of times a week. I'm still his little girl."

"I know how he feels. If there is any one gift that God has given me that is more precious than the others, it would be my daughter. It is so wonderful, Linda, the relationship she and I have. She is undoubtedly the single most grand thing that has happened in my life."

"That's the second time you've told me that, John. We talked about her when we drove up here the other day. It's unusual today for a father to express emotions like that for a child. That's one thing about you that I really like. You are not afraid to care openly about someone."

"I have always been that way about her. And, like your father, she will always be my little girl."

"The snow is still falling," he commented as he glanced toward the back windows of the cabin. "It is so peaceful, isn't it."

She lifted his hand and raised his arm slightly upward as she shifted position on the sofa. She wrapped his arm about her as she leaned softly against him. His hand, still in hers, rested in the warm area between her breasts. They sat like this in silence for several minutes as the calming peace surrounded their space in the room. The fire could still be seen flickering in the corner cracks of the stove and gave off the pleasant smell of burning oak.

"Let's not talk for awhile," she requested. "This silence is so relaxing."

He had never held her before, yet she felt so natural close against him in the darkness. He felt her warmth through her thin, silk blouse and he began to slowly rub the area where his hand lay, not desiring yet to touch her breast, only wanting to touch her soul. She stroked his hand in unison with the movements he made.

As the fire began to die down and the chill noticably came upon the room, he found his hand moving down toward her stomach. She turned toward him and rose slightly as their lips met. His mind was only concerned with this moment. All memories, all other thoughts, everything that pulled at him relentlessly, fell away into the night of the first snow.

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