What About This?

By Wayne William Cipriano

The rain, then freezing, then mist, then more rain, and more freezing – and so appears the crystal forest that never gets old nor routine. But then, what’s that? The sun coming out?

Rather than walk for the mail along our driveway, I chose to walk next to the driveway, through the woods. Which meant I was bombarded by ice falling from the bare tree branches as the rising air temperature and the strong sunlight melted the ice coating the tree branches throughout our woods. And it was wonderful!

Of course, it would not have been all that wonderful had the ice dropping down on me been of larger chunks, but they were not that big. The pieces of falling ice were large enough to catch the afternoon sun and appear as bright diamonds but not large enough to cause pain as they landed on my head, back, and shoulders (I was wearing a thick coat and two knit hats).

There was sufficient ice on branches of various thickness to melt at differing rates and fall in almost random patterns throughout my entire walk to the mailbox and back home – flashing diamonds all the way.

When I returned home, I insisted that Rosalie bundle up, put on a thick hat, and walk with me back through the woods so she could experience the wonder of an ice diamond shower as I had. She liked it a lot!

The next time you see those diamonds dropping from the trees, get your main squeeze to take a walk with you through the crystal downpour. Both of you will really dig it!