Does anyone remember the old classic “Rear Window” with Jimmy Stewart confined in his wheel chair whirling about catching a view of the antics of his neighbours? For me, this movie held a fascination regarding the curiosity within us all, “What’s going on around us; especially in our immediate neighbourhood”?
Rear Window came to mind the other evening amidst a blinding snow squall, as I sat at supper and peered out the dining room’s rear window into the storm buffeted by the tree line. The branches were laden with heavy fluffy snow. Snow was two feet deep on the ridge and one of our neighbours, a small deer, appeared plunging along its way. He was wearing his brown shaggy winter coat and feasting on the bark of a small sapling.
Then, two larger deer arrived on the scene. They were up to their bellies in snow with ears alert and twitching. The young deer kept enjoying his morsel of twigs as they passed. Next, two more deer trailed along and seemed to signal to their companions ahead, “It’s time to head for shelter; this blast is not going to abate”.
They changed course slightly with junior in tow and breaking trail, headed east, I presume, toward an evergreen shelter of pine in the woods behind the nearby Scouts Canada camp.
Yes, it’s February and this is our first blast of a roaring “old time” winter storm. A meteorologist doesn’t have to tell us how it is, we just need to look out our rear window.
Eileen Foran, CSJ