Christmas Day with family on a trail that has become an old friend. It snowed here earlier but we see none on the way to the beach, just the familiar shapes of an old growth forest— confusions of moss, dormant understory plants and an impossible number of spruce rising to the sky. It is all brown and green and asleep.

The sky wakes when we reach the beach an hour before official sunset, offering us a mix of grays and blues and yellows.  The tide and a northern wind have flooded the shore to the forest edge, leaving Aki without a beach to dash down.  She takes it well but does show impatience with my efforts to capture the sin now hitting Shaman Island.

It was a day without drama. Nothing to write or tell about. Just a simple walk with a friend and family on Christmas Day.