Wet snow fell by the inches yesterday, then turned to rain. The picture above shows the afternoon river through the scrim of clumpy snowflakes. Landing on the lacy ice floes midriver, they turned the multitude of shifting forms white.
The ice borders with their incremental creep toward the center and the playful flow of ice islands through the main channel came to an end some time in the night.
Around one this afternoon, I saw an ugly Ottauquechee for the first time. Crushed ice and snow created patternless masses jutting every direction. Fresher snow could not cover brown stains from earthy runoff. The entirely frozen surface under the bridge covered the river's flow for yards downstream until it burst out from below like a violent spring or a spout of lava at the center of the main current. It instantly split into three channels as a chunk of ice blocked its immediate path.
The weight of water dumped by the nor'easter smashed the symmetries of the past days.
One of the inspirations for doing this blog arose last winter as I would watch the relationship of ice, snow, water and light shift from day to day. To paraphrase Heraclitus, "You cannot take a picture of the same river twice."
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