Landscape in white.

The last time I attended a winter in the Mitten, I walked about neighborhood of my youth with the usual state of wonder; how things had changed, and how some things hadn't.

There were a lot more houses; the fields that surrounded my home were long ago replaced by large McMansions, and hastily constructed and re-constructed condominiums.  Two lane roads have become four lane roads.  Even the schools I attended as a wee little Historiclemo have grown past their original boundaries to accommodate a rising influx of students.

Of course, everybody I once knew have long since departed this neighborhood, but I still see them, of course....

The cute blonde girl named Cathy who lived near the top of the hill; my first all-encompassing crush.  And I think she knew; but we flew with different flocks.  And in those halcyon days, the flocks did not fly anywhere near together.

Kurt, the fast talking kid three doors down and across the street; he had this huge backyard ringed with trees where we played baseball all through the summer, from sunrise to sunset.  The house remains, although a lot worse for wear; I don't think anybody lives there anymore.

The Marshall boys; tough guys, to be sure.  Dangerous enemies, but valuable friends.  They threw themselves into everything they did; they played baseball like Ty Cobb, touch football like full contact....and always rode the dangerous rides.

The trees are larger, of course, and the hills are smaller.

The pond where we played hockey through the winter is privatized now.  They built houses all around it and there's no longer any access.  And the last time I was there, there was no hockey played there, either.  The surrounding hills were bulldozed smooth, covered with crisscrossed streets with silly names, and implanted with large houses with no furniture in their living rooms.  Lifeless places that light their lawns and eaves with Christmas lights, but do not seem to glow.

When I went for a walk in the late afternoon, as the sun gives up early and goes to bed, I walked the street that grew up behind the elementary school (Meadowbrook Elementary....back in the day, there was both a meadow AND a brook), and discovered that one of the great sledding hills had not been plowed under, but still remained for that use...

We called it BOX CANYON.  There were three runs on that hill; one called Big Ben, one called Little Ben, and one called Dangerous.  Each had an element of risk.  There was always a story that a kid got killed while sledding on the Dangerous one.  Isn't that always the case when you're a kid?

We sledded that hill rotten; without helmets.  On metal-runner sleds.  We would build elaborate jumps three quarters of the way down, so as to get the best velocity before becoming airborne.  We sledded there until we couldn't feel our limbs, and then we trudged home for dinner...and then, we'd put up torches along the edges, and sled at night under a sky filled with stars.  And we wouldn't come home until Dad blew his horn.

Laughter of children.  Cheering, wheezing, boisterous laughter in the dark.

Even the memory of it warms my soul.  Adults seldom get to laugh that long, that loudly, or that freely.

So, I stood there in the gathering darkness, watching the kids I didn't know sled down a hill that now seemed remarkably tame now that I grew taller and less impressed by anything.  I stood apart, of course, because the world has moved on and strangers are bad, and adult strangers are worse, and adult male strangers are the worst.  I wanted to re-live a memory, not scare a bunch of children into leaving.

And I watched.  And I listened.  And I smiled.  And when I thought I'd stayed too long, I moved on down the street, back to life, back to home.

I hope they didn't see me crying.

Joy and sadness are linked together like madness and genius.

And that's all I'm going to say about that.