We have clear skies and seasonal temperatures again today, which means a little warmth. This time of year, the mercury is difficult to track; we can go from a balmy thirty degrees to ten below in less than a day, if the winds are right, and an air temperature much colder yet.
We are due for more lows around zero by week’s end, but for now? It feels almost like a vacation.
Ordinary winter doesn’t bother us overmuch here. This is an elemental place, one of wild swings and harsh extremes, and we know what to expect. The unexpected benefit of that means that days such as these last few seem a rare gift, one to be treasured thoroughly in the moment, for we know how fast the patterns can swing the other way. The trick is to enjoy as much of the season as possible.
It requires warmth, of course, shelter and safety from wind and weather. But provided those needs are satisfied, there is much to love about winter here in all its fierce icy glory. And here at Red Willow, the elemental lines of a cold season plough the path to spring.
It is precisely on the coldest, clearest days when the lines are most evident: Remnant clouds trace roads across the sky; shelter posts and firewood reach, along with the tallest evergreens, to touch their tracks as they pass. These latter, too, are weathering the elements with us, making our survival possible.
The first of today’s three featured works embodies this very process, wrought in the colors of earth and sky, fire and water, wind and light — shades to brighten up the cold clear air. All three of these works are from the same category, and are found in the same section of the Bracelets Gallery here on the site. From the description of this first piece:
Weathering the Elements Coil Bracelet
Little teaches us humility as effectively as extremes of weather and climate. With this spiraling spangled coil, Wings calls upon these powerful forces for aid in weathering the elements. Each end begins with tiny polished free-form nuggets, little more than chips of sky blue turquoise in earthy matrix, each separated from the brilliance of more valuable blue turquoise by the golden artifice of iron pyrite — fool’s gold, a gift of the spirits to keep us humble when greed threatens to overtake good sense. Beyond the blue of Skystone and rain comes the power of fire — first amber, representing the golden edges of the flame, then bright red Mediterranean coral nuggets, the fire itself, all flanking a center row of bold doughnut-shaped rondel beads carved from impossibly chatoyant red tiger’s eye, like the very heart of the sun. Beads are strung on memory wire, which expands and contracts to fit virtually any wrist. Another view shown below. Designed jointly by Wings and Aji.
Memory wire; red tiger’s eye; Mediterranean coral; amber; blue turquoise; blue turquoise in matrix; iron pyrite
$325 + shipping, handling, and insurance
On days when the blues and whites of winter predominate, a little fire warms us all.
But winter here is not all cool colors, either. The red willows from which place and people find their names show their shades, barest stalks visible here in the lower foreground, to best effect now.
The “red” of red willow comes not from the leaves, but from the stalks and bark: hidden by long green strands in summer, stalks turning blue and purple as the cold encroaches, finally settling on their native red throughout the season. It makes for striking imagery at this time of year, burning bushes of scarlet flame lined atop and against hard-frozen snow. And their hardiness reminds us that winter is not an end, but a beginning, that we are strong enough to survive the turning of both seasons and time.
And it is this very turning that manifests in the second of today’s featured works. From its description:
Seasons and Time Coil Bracelet
Seasons and time are eternal, forces that teach us humility by their very endurance, humbling us in the face of their inexorable power. They teach us, too, to deal with impermanence: of weather, of youth, of troubled times and good ones, too. Wings honors their lessons in this coil of jewels, anchored at either end with pairs of faceted beads of smoky quartz, wrought in the wisdom-infused shape of eyes of Spirit. At each end, the coil begins with the blue skies of spring in the form of lightly polished free-form nuggets of robin’s-egg blue turquoise, moving thence into the brilliant greens of summer by way of lengths of smoothly polished geometric nuggets of malachite. From summer, we travel along the hoop to autumn, represented by smooth fiery amber, free-form and slender. Fall fire moves gently into the snows of winter, its white expanses formed from small polished chips of Hawai’ian puka shell. Both ends meet in the middle of the light, flanking a row of seven more Eyes of Spirit wrought in the exponential diamond patterns of faceted smoky quartz. Beads are strung on memory wire, which expands and contracts to fit virtually any wrist. Another view shown below. Designed jointly by Wings and Aji.
Memory wire; turquoise; malachite; amber; puka shell; smoky quartz
$325 + shipping, handling, and insurance
This, too, bears blue of sky and amber sun, brown of winter earth and the white of the snow upon it, touched at either end by the both cold-thriving evergreens and the lush greens of the summer to come — indeed, the very summer green born directly of the winter snows.
We think of lines as leading somewhere, and it is true that the lines of winter lead inexorably to spring. But not all lines are roads. Some sit at angles to earth and sky to form shelter; some curve and twist to create a song upon the wind or the medicine of the spirits.
The third of today’s featured works follows these same spiraling paths. From its description:
Medicine Coil Bracelet
We find truth in medicine, from the plants and the animals and more ephemeral spirits. Wings pays tribute to the power of traditional medicine to heal the body and restore harmony to the spirit by way of this coiling, curing circle of color. It begins at either end with the first medicine, water, that which gives and restores and is life itself, as embodied in bold bright blue nuggets of the Skystone, in the form of Sleeping Beauty turquoise. The water flows into the world of healing plants, beginning with wild freeform nuggets of malachite that become round polished malachite orbs. Small spheres of beautifully translucent jade stretch toward the large globes at the center, an expanse of small worlds in the form of unakite, gems manifest in the brilliance of new green aswirl with the red clay of the earth. Memory wire expands and contracts to fit nearly any wrist. Designed jointly by Wings and Aji.
Memory wire; Sleeping Beauty turquoise; malachite; jade; unakite
$325 + shipping, handling, and insurance
This is the medicine of the seasons, of the cold clear blue skies of winter above the rich green earth of summer, of the flowering rose fire of the light. It is the hope that rests deep in this month’s icy heart: like shed antlers, weathered white as snow, ancient spirits here to watch over the living hearts and lush coats of the elk herd that comes now to our land each night.
And come they do, as though summoned by the ghosts of ancestors long departed to find refuge here. They have come often, these last ten or eleven winters, save the last two, and their absence did not go unremarked.
Their return, then, is a welcome sign, one, seemingly, of the return of health and harmony to this land, as well. Their recent ancestral memory tells them that they have nothing here to fear, and they make full night use of this space as sanctuary: hay from stack and barn; water from the rain barrels; aspen trunks, just outside the window, against which to rub their antlers.
By dawn, the elk have long since departed, survival instinct driving them back beyond the range of most human sight during the hours of daylight. The barking of the dogs heralds their return each night, and then dogs and elk alike settle in to their routine fir the dark hours: the first to sleep; the second to eat and drink in safety.
In winter, not all shelter exists in the angle of structure; not all medicine in the spiral of ancient spirits. Sometimes, the elemental lines of a cold season come together in open space, an earthbound hoop to hold those in need of sanctuary . . . and to hold us with them, in their presence and with their acceptance.
Such is the nature of harmony.
~ Aji
All content, including photos and text, are copyright Wings and Aji, 2020; all rights reserved. Nothing herein may used or reproduced in any form without the express written permission of the owner.
