Distant plumes to the west and lenticular clouds in the east this morning have ceded the skies mostly to the bright blue of a winter midday. What clouds remain, however, whisper softly of a change to come, and soon: It’s hard to credit that this unseasonally warm day, already at fifty degrees, will be supplanted by rain and then snow for the next three days.
Still, the real magic occurred here last night — magic overhead, and magic here on the earth underfoot.
One of “our” dogs is feral; he was abused terribly as a very young pup, then abandoned with littermates and others to starve. Five years ago, they all found their way here, and of course we could not turn them away unfed and unwatered — and so they stayed, at least as long as is given to such wild creatures in such a dangerous area to do. Initially, there were six, in addition to our own dogs. One by one, they vanished, casualties of criminally over-the-limit colonizer traffic on the highway, or of what we might refer to, euphemistically, as apex predators. And we grieved them all, but we also knew the risks of creatures so badly tormented and then left to fend for themselves at far too young an age.
One, the least trusting of the bunch, has survived, and makes his home here now. I say “home,” and it is; he’s given the same meals, water, treats, and affection [at a distance he deems acceptable] as our other pups, but the effects of the abuse that he endured still endure in him, in his memory and spirit, and after five full years, he still cannot bring himself to trust us enough either to allow us to touch him or to come inside the house. He wants to do so; that much is abundantly clear. But the wages of abuse are levied upon the victim, and he has not quite been able to bring himself to cross the threshold.
We had had a doghouse for many years, although our dogs rarely used it, preferring to be indoors with us at night, or romping during the day. It wasn’t especially large, but it was serviceable, and Wings had insulated it completely. Still, Wings was dissatisfied with the size, and so he built a whole new doghouse, far larger and beautifully insulated on all sides, with an extension above the opening to block the worst of the elements. He set it upon our front deck, facing the front of the house with only perhaps three yards between his “door” and ours. He tarped it securely with oilcloth tarps, and we placed a soft but supportive bed inside, with a separate mat atop it; now there is also a blanket in it for him to snuggle into in the darkest hours.
And every night throughout the winter, I heat three “frisbees” in the microwave — discs specially designed to absorb, hold, and emanate heat for eight hours or more — and I pull out his bedding, place them between bed and mat, and push it all back into the recesses of the doghouse. It’s worked perfectly so far; even when nighttime temperatures plunge below zero, in the morning there is still plenty of residual heat and there is Cricket, safe and healthy and happy.
Last night just before I went to bed, I opened the front door, the heated frisbees and four tiny dog treats in my hands. The first thing I noticed was the scent: Skunk, somewhere nearby, feeling unhappy, threatened, or both, but not near enough to do me any harm. The second thing, immediately after, was more unnerving: a clacking, clattering sound, very near, like the music of old bones in the dark.
It took me a moment to realize that I had surprised the elk herd. The clattering sound was their hooves on frozen ground.
I stopped the breathe again, that millisecond of atavistic fear having stolen my breath just long enough for me to notice it, too. Then I spoke softly to them, calling them by their name in my language; for whatever reason, these great creatures two thousand miles from the herds of their relatives in my own homelands seem to recognize if not the words, at least the differences in formation and sound that tell them that this is one of the old languages, one their cousins elsewhere once knew and might still know. I told them they had nothing to fear from me, that they were welcome here and should stay.
And they stopped. Oh, they were wary, of course, and rightly so, but they stopped. They do, of course, know my voice; this isn’t our fist encounter by any means. But they halted their progress into the south field, and shining a light out that way, I could see these tall, elegant spirits standing quietly, as still as the night itself. that had enfolded them, and Cricket and me, in its blanket.
It was magic.
And it allowed me to rest after a very long, arduous day, this experience of connection to those with whom we share this land and whose existence we try to preserve. It’s yet one more example of the truth of the metaphors that our peoples so often use to explain life, being: a hoop; a braid; the weaving, and wovenness, of a blanket.
It’s a truth found in the form and shape of today’s featured work. From its description in the Rings Gallery here on the site:
Weaving the Blanket of Night Ring
Cobalt clouds and silver stars conspire at the work of weaving the blanket of night. With this ring, Wings evokes the deepening blues of the dark hours and the trailing bands of stardust whose warp and weft hold together the web of the sky. The band is formed of a solid and substantial gauge of sterling silver pattern wire, molded in ridged lines and criss-crossing ribbons that evoke the braided geometry of the Art Deco era. At either end, a spectacular oval of cobalt blue lapis lazuli, marbled with deeper blues and webbed with delicate traces of calcite, rests in the embrace of a saw-toothed bezel. The ends of the band are set a few millimeters apart, angled to permit adjustment: Widening the band will set the stones further apart; narrowing it will allow them to slide past each other. Band is roughly 2.5″ long by 5/16″ wide; as shown, ring is currently a generous size 11.25; cabochons are 3/8″ long by 1/4″ across (all dimensions approximate). Other views shown above, below, and at the link.
Sterling silver; lapis lazuli
$375 + shipping, handling, and insurance
But the elks’ visitation was not the only gift of magic the night hours held.
It had been so dark when I first heard them that they were utterly invisible to me — indeed, even after my eyes adjusted, I still could not see them at all without aid of a flashlight. I had not realized how fully the clouds had moved in, blanketing the glow of every last star in the sky. After the night’s impossibly late (or more accurately, impossibly early) moonrise, all the showed through the unbroken cloud cover was a faint amber glow above Pueblo Peak’s southern point; the moon itself was already veiled entirely, with only the faintest light radiating beneath it.
But I awakened shortly after three o’clock, aware subconsciously, perhaps, that something in the light (or lack thereof) outside the window had changed. I looked out, and the night had shifted from black to deepest blue, lighter blue clouds scudding in small pods across the southeast sky, some rising in curling points like waves, others looking for all the world like whales swimming intently to a new destination.
That, too, was magic. It was also, like the first experience some hours prior, medicine.
I don’t sleep much anymore; one of the most consistent ravages of autoimmune disease is intractable insomnia. But if my rest must be delayed or broken, let it always be by such gifts: a reminder that our existence is inextricably woven with the spirits of night earth and sky, and that to protect their existence and well-being is medicine for us all.
~ Aji
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