There was a year when so much snow fell relentlessly week after week that the bridges in the ravine became so packed tight you had to walk across them at the level of the top rail. We're not yet at that
condition with the snowpack this year, but not all that far off, either. All things being equal, and with the effect of January's thaw, the snowpack is dense and high this year as well. Quite a departure from the last few years, when this region's snowfall was relatively light in comparison to what is considered the norm for the Ottawa Valley.

Now, when we cross the bridges, we're about at the mid-level point of the snowpack height, reaching to the middle rail. It's an odd sensation, actually, to find yourself experiencing the disequilibrium-effect of a familiar height suddenly becoming unfamiliar from a different perspective in height.

It's easy enough to judge the height of the prevailing snowpack, comparing the height you're standing at, with familiarity, standing beside trees that you know during other seasons appear differently. We can judge that we're standing anywhere from a foot and a half to two feet higher on the forest floor, over the hard-packed collection of snow and ice trodden on the trails, when a crotch in a tree trunk, or a depression in its bark is now at waist-level where normally it is at the level of my shoulders.

We'll have a real gusher of a spring run-off this year, depending on how gradual the melt will be due to atmospheric conditions as spring comes in. Even on the street above, the collection of snow from shovelling out driveways has created high obstacles to observing the flow of traffic, attempting to back out of driveways.

Because our house fronts on the north-west angle of the street it will also take considerably longer for the packed snow to melt away, revealing the frozen earth below. For me, it will be a time of curious assessment, anticipating the eruption of early-, mid- and late-spring bulbs that I planted last fall.