Iced fog

Late winter 2009/2010 ~

It was an unusual sequence of weather. After weeks of below normal temperatures—the kind of deep cold that can make winter seem torturous and long—we had enjoyed a day of unseasonable warmth. The rays of sunlight actually felt warm… a sensation I had not felt since late fall. Melting snow dripped from the rooftops, and a few blades of grass could be seen peeking through the receding snow, in places where the wind had kept snowdrifts from forming.

That evening, just as the sun was sinking into the west, a low bank of clouds moved in, cloaking the sky for as far as the eye could see. That kind of cloud cover has the effect of a blanket, sealing in whatever warmth was created by the day. But it wouldn’t last. The clouds would be pushed quickly through the area by a high pressure system, like a snow-plow shoving snow from a highway. Behind it, the sky would clear and temperatures would once again plummet, as often happens when a weather system comes to call from the far north.

The next morning, the view from our back door was near stunning… a result of the dramatic swing in temperatures. The day before, the sun’s warmth created pools of water from the melting snow; puddles that had now been frozen in their tracks, before they had a chance to run for the river. Overnight, the warm water that had turned to steam sought to climb back into the sky and rejoin its fellow clouds. But the suppressive cold of early morning kept the fog from rising more than twenty or thirty feet into the air. It was if the haze was hitting an invisible ceiling that covered the meadow, and did not have the strength to break through. Never before had I seen such a well-defined patch of fog, allowing a crystal-clear view of the meadow in the foreground, and easy sight of the treetops in the distant background, perhaps a half-mile away. It was as if the energy of the fog had been sapped by the chill... suspending it somewhere between ground and sky. Eventually, the haze would fall back to the ground as frost.

Winter, you have won this battle, but you will not win the war. Spring is not far away, and it will bring a sun which rises higher and longer, delivering a more direct, radiant beam. Eventually, the moisture that has been confined as ice and snow will be warmed to the point that it will be freed… to become the river, lake or cloud it aspires to be.

© 2010 Mike D. Anderson. All rights reserved.