Mono Basin Journal
A roundup of less political events at Mono Lake
by Geoff McQuilkin
The wind works with the material it is given. In the
summer, it’s dust but recently it was fresh snow, whipped up into
spiraling white columns reaching toward the cold winter sky, then
pirouetting across the flats. The dance swung here and there, then some
unseen air current undercut the show, collapsing the snow devil and
leaving you to wonder if you had really seen it at all.
And now the equinox has gone by; the days last, the sun beats harder and longer against the marks of winter. South facing slopes go bone dry while their north facing counterparts still host deep shady snow. In meadows and on open slopes, fields of snow are no longer flat. The sun melts patterns deep into them where pebbles, twigs, and pine needles absorb the day’s heat and chart a course for firm ground. They descend down into the deep snow, slow-motion travelers, melting their way toward the earth below.
It’s backcountry skiing time with a natural slalom: left around the sagebrush, right turn at the rock, quick left around the willows. Miss that turn and you end up lying in the spring snow; look up, and there are the gulls, returning again to nest at the lake, white wings outlined against the blue sky as hints of summertime cumulus clouds dance over the snowy Sierra crest.
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