Snow geese

This story was given dramatic presentation by the Vermont Stage Company in December 2005

By Abbie Senesac
Champlain Valley Union High School, Grade 10

“Silence is golden,” grandmother says.

No it isn’t, I think to myself. It’s white.

I know it is winter when you can no longer see the sun through the skylights in the den. The grass pokes through the dusting of snow and frost on the lawn, and even the old oak tree in the yard looks cold, shivering every so often with the nippy breezes that grandmother says Jack Frost blows through.

She bids farewell to her garden, clipping the last good flowers and kissing the dying ones into a deep winter’s sleep. I stand with her, letting the wonderful white silence engulf me as I face the sunset over the cornfields below the bank. I see the farmer with his plow in tow, churning out the leftover stock from this past harvest. He is getting ready for them, I whisper to myself, my breath lingering in a cloud in front of me.

“What was that?” grandmother asks.

“He is getting ready for the geese,” I say, pointing at the farmer in the tractor with a frozen pink finger.

“Ah, yes, the geese will be coming soon,” she smiles. I stuff my hands under my armpits and watch the tractor skate across the frozen wonderland until grandmother pushes a bunch of black-eyed susans into the crook of my arm and beckons me inside. The sun is nearly set behind the mountains, its last light reflecting in my eyes.

I lay in bed that night, the dull drone of the heater filling the cool night air that slips through the cracks in my window. I stare sleepily at my reflection, studying my eyes and nose, counting the freckles on my cheeks by the dim glow of the nightlight next to my bureau. I am determined not to go to sleep; what if they come during the night? I would miss them! But I cannot overcome the weights that pull on my eyelids, so I shut them. The soft creek of the few remaining crickets grows quieter and quieter until they fade off, and the only sound is the steady drip of the water in the gutters above.

I wake to the snowy stillness that rests on my windowsill. I peer cautiously out the frosted window, as if a fearsome beast may be waiting for me on the other side. But I am surprised to see a foot of soft powder covering the frozen ground. The baby fir trees are iced with lacy white decorations, and the naked branches of the oak tree look splendid in their sparkling winter coats.

I scramble to put on my long underwear over my pajamas, and plod downstairs to the welcoming smell of maple bacon and eggs. Mother is standing at the stove, peeling raw bacon slices out of their plastic wrappings and placing them in the frying pan. She glances over her shoulder and smiles at me, but I take no notice. I yank on my purple snow boots and open the front door.

I am afraid to step outside, afraid to ruin the perfectly curved snowdrifts with my clumsy winter boots. There are tiny mouse prints etched in the bank to my right, and the tinkling of the wind chime reminds me how little I am wearing. But I shut the door behind me anyway.

The soft crunch of the snow under my feet echoes in the yard. I bear my weight tenderly on each foot, trying not to sink too far down into the heaps of powder. As I work through the courtyard and towards the bank, I stare up at the sky, which is dark and ominous as a pirate’s flag. I spot a patch of darkness in the sky, and another above that. Clouds do not move that quickly.

And that is when I realize that they are here.

Suddenly, my heart is pounding swiftly as the beat of an African drum, and I am sprinting from the backyard back to the porch, pounding on the windows, jumping up and down, and making the biggest possible commotion a 5 year-old can make. Mother just pokes her head up from the stove, so I wrench the door open and run through the kitchen to the stairs. It seems I have woken everyone up, as my bewildered father and equally as confused grandmother stumble into the kitchen in their robes and fuzzy slippers. But there is no time. I leave a puddle of melting snow behind me as I race to the backyard, my cheeks burning red and my curly strawberry-blond hair like flames streaking after me.

I am out of breath, my lungs screaming for air when I see the first group of them land. It is like watching a ballet; each goose in the formation lifting their wings to slow themselves, and gliding like swans until their delicate webbed feet skim the tops of the snow drifts. Their gray-blue beaks part beautifully as they called to their mates, swooping valiantly through the frozen winter air.

I am entranced as I watch them. They are so graceful, so perfect. Their pearly feathers are sleek and unruffled by the wind, their complacent glass eyes not showing any fatigue after their long flight. I want to get closer; I want to stroke their soft snowy bodies and beautifully curved heads and necks, but they are far down the bank, too far for me to stray. So I sit cross-legged on the bench and stare, awe-struck and spellbound.

The snow geese are still arriving in large flocks as we sit down for dinner. I let the Shepard’s pie on my plate grow cold as I fix my gaze on the newcomers soaring through the darkening sky. It is snowing again, but I know it is not really snow. I know that it is the gentle down feathers from the geese in the fields. And I know that they are not really snow geese at all, but angels in masquerade. I know this because I saw them descend from the skies, straight from heaven. But I do not share this with my grandmother or my parents. Grown-ups don’t understand these things.

I mark the days off one by one, a single X for every day the birds stay in the fields. I spend most of my afternoons watching them through the porch door, pressing my nose against the cold glass and rubbing off the condensation every once in a while. I am trying to find my angel. Grandmother tells me I have a guardian angel, and that she is always watching over me, wherever I go. Grandmother knows a lot about angels; she prays to them every morning, asking for help or strength, so I figure she knows.

I wake up on the third morning; the sun is bright, twisting rainbows through my wind chimes onto the coral striped walls. I look out the window, anxiety playing across my face like a shadow puppet. But I do not see them.

A few stragglers are huddled together in the very center, but the rest have gone. The field is depressingly bare, white feathers strewn, entwined with snow and dried corn husks. My face falls with disappointment and sadness. I did not find my angel.

I mope around the house for the rest of the week. It is winter vacation, but it is hardly worth celebrating as every day goes by and I cannot peer out the window and watch for her. As Christmas comes and goes, I try to remember what the valley looked like, covered in the soft down and beating wings of the geese. But my mind wanders, blowing away helplessly like the feathers across the frozen wasteland.

Before I know it, Sunday has come. My aunt and uncle and grandmother line up to take hugs a kisses before we all head back to our respective homes, bellies stuffed and good times had. I allow my relatives to squeeze me before I am lofted into the car by my father, who smiles understandingly at me.

As I wave goodbye to them as we pull out of the driveway, I take one last longing stare at the field. There is one goose, sitting huddled by the bank, neck swung gracefully over her back. But as we drive away, she looks up, her glassy eyes meeting my wide blue ones. I press my face against the window and grin. My mother turns around and sees me staring at the fields. “All you did was mope around watching those birds,” she says. “They are only geese.”

“No,” I say quietly, just loud enough to be heard, “they are angels.”