A cabin on Gum Run |
"Why is it so noisy in this night," he asked?
"The seasons are changing," I told him. It was a comforting sound to me after the scorching forest fires and the long days of making syrup, but to him it was unsettling.
"Don't worry, you are a little chipmunk safe and snug in your log. Safe from cold rain and tugging winds."
He shook his head unsure.
"It is the night that is so scary though!," he whispered."The night is so dark and noisy and big.Why is the night so angry?"
Spring floods, Gum Run |
In the morning he asked to see the rivers that the sugar trees drink from. The rivers sweep past like excited chattering crowds, so fast as if they can not wait to see what lays around the next bend in the land and mountain.
"They are in a hurry," he tells me in amazement. "They must want to get to where they are going, because it must be a great place to get to."
He reached into the air as if trying to pull something unseen from it.
"But where is the snow? Will it come back soon? Will we make sugar today," he asked?
"No sugar today," I tell him. "No sugar making till next winter comes again. But now we will bottle the syrup."
He shrugs as if this makes sense. "Bottling season," he announces. "First is the snow season. Then the sugar season. Now the bottling season. I think we have a lot of fun and yummy seasons in the mountains," he tells me. "I think the sugar trees love it here in the mountains, because they have lots of rivers to drink from and wind to dance in and because they think the night is not big and scary. Even if the chipmunk thinks it is."
Cooling bottles of syrup on the Home Comfort Range |
2 comments:
Very impressive!! I am awestruck that you made that much syrup on your stove! Snow season, sugar season, bottling season, wood-gathering season...
...and when does the resting season start? Did I miss it again?...
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