Seeing a fond and familiar place in an unfamiliar light is like undertaking a new journey with an old friend – it deepens old bonds and forges new ones, strengthening a connection in beautiful and unexpected ways. To visit Flying Cloud during the winter is to undertake such a journey. Warm grass and soft earth underfoot are supplanted by the crunch of ice. The trickle of a still flowing stream is now bare in winter’s snow. Memories of a hot day’s swim in the puddle are juxtaposed with a primal inclination to STAY AWAY from the open water where ice has been cut out. Digging a block of ice out of the icehouse during the summer will be forever changed once you have seen it sawed free, pulled out of the puddle, loaded onto a sled and dragged to the loading door.
The opportunity to connect with friends, old and new, and revisit the person you were during the summer reaffirms the values that made Flying Cloud your home away from home. Ice cutting will connect you with the community borne of those values again like it is for the first time. This event will be new ways of seeing and understanding a familiar place, or for some, the start of a new journey altogether – as it was mine more than a decade ago.
New face or old friend, I hope to see you at Ice Cutting! It’s held over President’s Day Weekend, February 14th to the 17th. We cut ice, dance to live music, play games and have a whole lot of fun. Signup information can be found HERE. If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to get in touch with me at charlie@farmandwilderness.org.