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Amy Sander Montanez is a writer, teacher, therapist, retreat leader, and spiritual director who attends Trinity Cathedral, Columbia. You can access an archive with her award-winning reflections on the diocesan Web site at www.edusc.org/News and learn more about Amy at her Web site, www.amysandermontanez.com.

In the Moment—One Pilgrim's Attempt to Be Present

By Amy Sander Montanez, D. Min.

A snowy surprise

We were hiking at the top of a gorge along the side of a waterfall when I noticed the first one. I stood still for a minute and watched in silence, checking my perception and holding my breath in anticipation. “Nicky, is that snow?” I whispered. Sure enough, the tiniest flakes were coming down, barely big enough to see. We both took a minute to enjoy the October surprise and to let a few of those cold flakes rest on our hair and tickle our noses. October 14th. That seemed early for snow to me.

When we descended the mountain, the snow had mostly stopped, and by the time we were back into Ithaca we didn’t notice any more. There was a scattered cold rain all afternoon, but nothing that stopped daily life from moving on. We kept on with our plans of driving up the East side of Lake Cayuga and tasting the wines on that side of the lake. I remembered hearing Frederick Buechner say, “Never change your plans on account of the weather”, and I told Nick that I was glad we had not changed our plans. We would have missed the snow at the top of the gorge as well as some amazing wines and a lovely and intimate late lunch at an Inn had we been stopped by what appeared at the outset to be a gloomy, damp, cold day.

But the best surprise awaited us the next morning. At 6 am when we opened our hotel curtains we were greeted by a winter wonderland. Four inches of snow had fallen over night in the Finger Lakes Region of New York, and it had fallen slowly and softly so everything was covered, coated, and laden with the new, white, and very shiny snow. Waking to a surprise like this is one of the great pleasures of life for me. It evokes memories of growing up on Long Island and waking to a newly fallen snow. It evokes the feeling that plans will have to change, and usually for the best. No school, hot chocolate, homemade soup. It’s like having an unexpected but well-loved friend arrive at your door on a Sunday afternoon. Oh my! Change of plans! How wonderful! How long can you stay? We finished packing to leave, thanked the hotel staff for a lovely stay, borrowed a snow-scraper from someone better prepared than we were, and headed back to Manhattan. What awaited us on our drive is hard to describe. Here’s my best shot.

If Monet had painted snow covered mountains, I believe they would have looked like this. All of the brilliant colored leaves of autumn were still on the trees. The fiery reds, the neon pinks, the pumpkin oranges and the deep golds already had the hillsides awash in color. Coat that with a layer of white, translucent snow, and what was there closely resembled an impressionistic painting. Like a mound of candy and desserts, the mountains were peaches and cream, raspberry mousse, strawberry parfaits, and caramel-filled chocolates, stacked one on top of another. Depending on how the sun filtered through the morning cloud cover, they either sparkled like jewels or looked like a fruit-infused glaze on top of a bundt cake. It was hard to take it all in. We stopped several times to try to capture something of it in pictures, knowing all the time that this is one of those times that “you just had to be there”.

Perhaps this was the Finger Lakes Region at its most magnificent. It was beautiful before the snow. The crystal clear lakes, the vineyards running down the hillsides all the way to the shores, the array of colors of the fall foliage, the multi-storied gorge walls, stacked with three or four different types of rocks, the wealth of waterfalls and trails all add up to an amazing area of the country. Add a layer of the first snow of the season and you’ve got quite a treat. We knew, at that moment, that we may never see anything like that again in our lives.

There are many, many opportunities to see something for the first time. In fact, the recent gospel of the blind beggar reminds us that we are all blind and in need of seeing anew. Today I am thankful for that reminder in the splendor of nature that my vacation provided me. Where in your life can you see something new? Is God providing you with opportunities to slow down and look more deeply at something that is right in front of you?

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