Photo of the Day: Icy Wooded Way, NJ

In my neck of the woods in Northern New Jersey this winter, more so than in my childhood, the weather has tended less towards snow than what the weather forecasters call a “wintry mix”—i.e., some combination of snow, rain, freezing rain and sleet. There might be less of the white stuff on the ground, but that doesn’t make it necessarily easier to take.

What I’m talking about is ice, like what we had Friday night into Saturday morning. For the first time that I can remember, the local news stations’ meteorologists were explaining how an uptake of, say, 0.19” versus 0.3” of ice could lead to more of the crystal clinging to wires—and causing power outages.

And that’s not even the getting into walking or driving on “black ice.”

So far this season, I’ve been grateful not just that this “wintry mix” has occurred on weekends, but also during a period when I could work remotely. This means that I haven’t had to drive to work in uncertain, shifting conditions for nearly an hour before the sun even comes out in the morning.

So, Saturday morning, I waited—and waited—until the snow on the street and sidewalk across from my home increasingly melted. At 10 am, beginning to get cabin fever, I walked out to my driveway for a quick trip to the store. Even at that point, I was careful to grab hold of my car to keep from falling—something I might have survived without serious mishap when younger, but much less likely now.

By mid-morning, the ice was in retreat. But you could still see evidence of it on the ground, as I did when I photographed this wintry, grassy corner in Tenafly, near the Roosevelt Common.

During the spring, summer, fall, and even warmer winter days, parents are likely to take their kids and dogs, happy to have the protection of tree branches. But by mid-afternoon on Saturday, this section of the park was empty, with the trees casting lonely shadows on the ground. For those willing to brave the wind chill in the teens, the sight of all this ice would have been the last straw, forcing a fast rethinking of their plans.

Photo of the Day: Gray Skies and Fountain, Roosevelt Common, Tenafly, NJ

Though I live more than two miles away, Tenafly’s Roosevelt Common has been a constant in my life for 45 years. The site’s memorial to Theodore Roosevelt holds its interest, but above all, its pond has been a source of tranquility and even beauty for me.

The fountain at the center of the pond especially drew my interest today—enough, obviously, that I photographed it.

The thermometer may have read 49 degrees but with no sun, it felt cooler. Elsewhere in town, even as seats and tables remained in place for outdoor dining, they were largely unused, with potential patrons no doubt discouraged by the plunging mercury.

The gray sky seemed an appropriate reflection of the gray spirits so many have felt in this region of the Northeast in recent days as COVID-19 cases increase, along with the probability of tighter restrictions on business and private gatherings.

Given these circumstances, then, seeing this pond and fountain didn’t make my heart soar. But it was a sign of life, the way water always is, even amid a contraction of nature that has felt more severe this year than ever before.