Before and after the (disappointing) Déluge at the Highland Crossing

Posted by [email protected] | Feb 16, 2021 | Cultural Life | 0 |

[2/16/21 The Highland Crossing Trail in Brighton. Photos: David Kramer 2/15 and 2/16]

As seen in Tracking the prints of a deer on the Highland Crossing in Brighton, since last March, we’ve visited the Highland Crossing Trail in Brighton several times, usually after a snowfall. (SEE SERIES AT END)

Hence, I was eagerly awaiting the predicted massive snowfall as the polar vortex made a historically cold journey from the Arctic Ocean to the Gulf of Mexico. Between a foot and a foot and a half inches of snow was to fall on our heads and frozen limbs by Tuesday morning.

On Monday, I took a photo op at the trail in anticipation of le Déluge. I met closed-eyed Tracy who hikes the crossing every other week or so.

2/15/21 Tracy. Après moi, le déluge [attributed to King Louis XV of France]

That evening, I put my boots on the heater as I was expecting a perilous trek through snow drifts and mounds.

2/15/21

Early Tuesday, I awoke in the middle of the night. Peering out the window, I saw no flakes. Several hours later, as the sun rose, again, I saw no flakes. Weather.com forecasted cloudy skies but no Déluge.

My first stop was Lac de Ville Boulevard. On Monday, en route to the trail and Topps, I came across three oranges in the snow. I hid them behind a zoning sign, planning to retrieve the fruit on my return.

2/16/21 L’amour des trois oranges [The Love for Three Oranges, Op. 33 by Sergei Prokofiev]

However, I forgot to bring the citrus home. The delectables were still there Tuesday morning, but hardly buried deep in a snow pack. The Great Storm proved anticlimactic.

As seen in the before and after montage, disappointingly, on Tuesday the trail did not look that different from Monday.

2/15 and 2/16

2/15

2/15. Depending on which direction you are heading, the Highland Crossing Trail begins or ends at Brighton Town Park. This lonely sojourning cross country skier at BTP describes his trek as a “meditative trance.” While mostly clearing his mind, the sojourner does ponder, “Where is the North Pole?”

THE HIGHLAND CROSSING SERIES

Tracking the prints of a deer on the Highland Crossing in Brighton

Following a gaggle of wild turkeys on the Highland Crossing Trail in Brighton

The first December snowfall at the Highland Crossing Trail in Brighton

First November snowfall at the Highland Crossing in Brighton

Distributing masks in Brighton and revisiting (again) the Highland Crossing Trail in (another) May snowfall

During a dusting of May snow, revisiting the Highland Crossing Trail in Brighton

On the Highland Crossing Trail in Brighton after an early March snowfall

About The Author

[email protected]

Welcome to Talker of the Town! My name is David Kramer. I have a Ph.D in English and teach at Keuka College. I am a former and still active Fellow at the Nazareth College Center for Public History and a Storyteller in Residence at the SmallMatters Institute. Over the years, I have taught at Monroe Community College, the Rochester Institute of Technology and St. John Fisher College. I have published numerous Guest Essays, Letters, Book Reviews and Opinion pieces in The New York Times, Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, the Buffalo News, the Rochester Patriot, the Providence Journal, the Providence Business News, the Brown Alumni Magazine, the New London Day, the Boston Herald, the Messenger Post Newspapers, the Wedge, the Empty Closet, the CITY, Lake Affect Magazine and Brighton Connections. My poetry appears in The Criterion: An International Journal in English and Rundenalia and my academic writing in War, Literature and the Arts and Twentieth Century Literary Criticism. Starting in February 2013, I wrote for three Democratic and Chronicle blogs, "Make City Schools Better," "Unite Rochester," and the "Editorial Board." When my tenure at the D & C ended, I wanted to continue conversations first begun there. And start new ones. So we created this new space, Talker of the Town, where all are invited to join. I don’t like to say these posts are “mine.” Very few of them are the sole product of my sometimes overheated imagination. Instead, I call them partnerships and collaborations. Or as they say in education, “peer group work.” Talker of the Town might better be Talkers of the Town. The blog won’t thrive without your leads, text, pictures, ideas, facebook shares, tweets, comments and criticisms.