Everyone likes a room with a view.  Otherwise, why do we need windows?  Does anyone want to look out over the Fresh Kills Land on Staten Island, the Gowanus Canal or the latest toxic runoff pond from some mine in northern Canada?  No, we don’t.  And, I believe I can speak for most of us, we all want a view, but a view filled with beauty.

Below is a photograph of our bedroom window.  When we were looking at the house prior to buying it, we looked out all the windows…to check out the views.  Some of the things we could see were nothing to write home about.  Like our front porch.  Nice, but not something you’d want to look at for more than a minute or two.  Our living room picture window provided a killer view of Rainbow Lake and our little dock down the hill.  The kitchen window gave us a superb view of our bird feeders (as well a fine line of sight to our Kenmore BBQ, which is a real feast for the eyes.  But our bedroom window was in a class all by itself.  From the comfort of our four-poster, we could watch the seasons as they marched through our little front yard in all their timely glory.

In the Spring, we could look out and see the Purple Tirilium growing in the small thicket that partly hid our house from the road.  I could watch the ferns grow and cover the ground around the evergreens with a lovely carpet of greenery.  I could see our car, the r-pod and the back door of the garage that had a window planter I had attached to the rose colored cinder-blocks.  Bright red flowers hung from the pot like a Bavarian chalet.

In the Summer, we could see the small patch of grass that served as our lawn.  I could also get a fine view of the new stone walkway our neighbors, D’Arcy and Judy so artfully constructed.  If I leaned a bit, I could see our cottage sign, Tir Na Nog. That was the name of our cottage.  Many of the local cottages bore names like Heron Point, Three Pines or Camp Trout.  Our house was named for the Irish myth and meant “Land of Eternal Youth”.  I could also see the car.

In the Autumn, the few hardwoods would be aflame with colors of the brightest yellows and reds.  The ferns would begin to go brown.  The sky would turn grey and the mushrooms would push up through the dying ferns.  And, I could see our car.

In normal Winters, we could see the boughs of the pines holding the soft, pure snow.  The little animal tracks could be seen on the virgin snow.  Oh, the snow!  It would fall and swirl about like we lived in a glass snow globe.  On clear nights, I could go to the deck, wearing a cozy woolen sweater and watch Orion make his hunting journey across the small patch of clear sky above our house.  Out of our bedroom window on winter days, I could see the back door of the garage, the bright red flowers, faded now.  And, I could see our car to study the few inches of snow it had covering it.  Then I would gleefully take the broom and brush the dusting of snow from the car’s roof, then make fluffy snowballs to toss at the scampering squirrels and they darted here and there trying to find their nuts.

But, this winter.  The great winter of 2013-14 was a different story altogether.  The r-pod has vanished beneath a small mountain of snow. Our garage may or may not still be there.  For all I know, someone could have taken it during one of the snowstorms…or on a night when it was -23 F and I failed to check why the garage wasn’t visible anymore.  Our car?  It may be still in the driveway…maybe not.  I’ve given up trying to keep the snow off it and from fallen down my back from the two feet of the white stuff that clung to the overburdened branches of the pine trees…if the pine trees are still there.  Even the squirrels have given up trying to find their nuts.  We have a young man who comes out after a snowfall and plows us out.  We get a bill for every visit.  I made some calculations.  We’ve just paid his child’s tuition at Yale.

The mountain (not a mound anymore) of snow seen from our bedroom window is large enough now that I’ve given some thought to installing a chair-lift…just for beginners, though.  Maybe a luge course?  Maybe a training area for Everest climbers?

At this point in the post, I know most of you don’t believe me so I took a picture from our bedroom looking out at the view.  See the lovely lace curtains?  See the cool dream-catcher?  See the white/grey view through the window?  That’s snow.  That’s all we can see.

This is our Room With a View.