Sun lit the bits of fog floating above the steamy lake. The light was pink, and a sailboat etched in the haze was a solitary figure floating on reflective liquid silver. I wished for my camera, but will have to make the words paint the pictures this morning.
The Cascades were sharp silhouettes against the blue. Although they are white with snow this time of year, they were dark shadows this morning, jagged and distant.
The pink light of sunrise played off the mist and the cold. A single paddle-boarder (dressed Seattle-style in hat, coat, shorts and flip-flops) appeared out of the cloud, a distant figure prompting me to comment that only a guy would be dumb enough to be out there in this freeze.
But Seattle is Seattle, and January 1 is January 1. The recent addition of a line of Porta-potties herald the event of the day, the noon-time Polar Bear swim, with a new “Polar Bear Club” right beforehand, “a special time just before the "Polar Bears" for younger folks or people needing a little more room.”
A young man and a rosy-cheeked woman threw a stick for their Aussie, the remnants of an early breakfast on a nearby picnic table. The Mallards gathered near the shore, the water shiny and reflective, a tinge of fuchsia above the silver. A fat squirrel, probably triple his summer weight, streaks across the frosty grass towards the line of trees still showing green, Camellias, a tall Madrona, and the red-barked cedars.
Finding it within his awkward silhouette to soar, a merganser lazed through the mist, and 2013 dawned clear and cold. Obama won major concessions last night – he seems tougher and more resolute, if that is possible – in this second term. The future seems more rosy than a year ago, a tinge of hope above the gray.
