Blog Entry 2 -- Hazy Shade of Winter

I’ve been fascinated by the ice since my visit to the pond last week. Over the weekend, when temperatures stayed in the single digits, Lake Michigan started to freeze. That water is more active than the pond, shifting as it freezes so ice forms in sheets and chunks. Along the shoreline, or what I can see of it when I’m on Lake Shore Drive, there are varying patterns of ice drifting on the surface. This is different from the South Pond, a mostly still body of water, that last week had a thin cover of shiny ice. This week the ice is thicker, its color the same bluish gray as the sky. The cracks have multiplied and stand out because snow or frost has accumulated in the indentations. Snow dusts the surface like sugar on a coffee cake. Even fewer people are at the pond. The temperature has climbed into the teens after three days near zero degrees. There are also fewer critters around. The geese aren’t here.

A view across the pond to statue of Grant. Quirk of Chicago: Lincoln Park has a statue
of Grant; Grant Park has a statue of Lincoln.

Mucho and I, however, decided to walk. He tried to pull me toward home once or twice on our mile-long trek. I forced him to keep heading south. When we arrived, crows were busy in the south end of the pond near the old boathouse. Five or six of them perched in a tall tree, and a few hovered around the open water near an aerator. As with the geese last week, they dispersed shortly after we got there. I have trouble believing it’s Mucho and me. They must be used to people and dogs. Or is it because Mucho is big?

The middle section of the pond was eerily quiet. Once the crows scattered, the only movement was small drifts of snow flitting across the pond like tiny ghosts. The snow’s not deep enough to cover the surface, so the drifts weren’t much bigger than my hand. They looked like something magic, some winter secret.

I found a sign that described life on the pond in winter. I know there are rabbits around, probably hiding from Mucho. I’ve learned that the fish, bluegill and largemouth bass, head to the bottom of the pond and burrow. The same with turtles. I still haven’t seen any insects. Along the edge of the pond near the zoo farm, where I’ve been hanging out, the shore is thick with pond grass. It’s brown and bent at the tips. I look into the stalks, but don’t see or hear anything.

Little prairie in the big city

I’ve read there’s a coyote who lives around the pond. I worry about what might happen if we saw him or her, though I’m sure the coyote avoids humans. We passed the coyote enclosure at the zoo on our way to the pond. There was a line of trees and two fences in between the sidewalk along the outside and the coyote enclosure. I could see three or four. They didn’t even turn to look at us. But Mucho stopped, his nose in the air.

My visit ended when a young man, his jacket unzipped and his face a bright pink, yelled from across the pond. As he stomped along the pristine and deserted boardwalk he screamed curse words and yelled about wanting to kill someone, finally yelling about killing himself. Part of me wanted to leave quickly, and part of me wanted to make sure he didn’t do anything to harm himself around the icy water.

This is the ecology of city life. And this is nature. There’s more to nature than the things we attach to the word: plants, animals, weather. This man’s outburst probably has to do with brain chemistry, a part of nature not many of us understand. As Janisse Ray wrote in Ecology of a Cracker Childhood, "If ever there was a wilderness misunderstood, insanity is it." Some other nature writers touch upon the interior landscape versus the exterior, and the way each affects the other. I can only hope that the cold air, fast walking and quiet park did something to calm this man’s interior landscape.