Snobbin: Beautiful Trash in the Pop Culture Gutter

 The fire pit hisses in the scattered rain. Dark drops crash against uprooted spruce, As I take respite in the fire away from the frantic talk. An Afghan Whigs album on the turntable struggles  To rise above the bustle and hiss. The river beckons. I must hover.

Otis the cat should survey the trees and birds, But he'd rather annoy me. Since the sentinel spruce and maples do not heed him, He licks the window in small circles. Nearby chickadees care little For these feline demonstrations. The cold weather snaps us to attention, And the snow falls silently while we watch From inside a creaky house, hoping for touches of lenient spring amidst the wintery chills.

Snow on spruce boughs, The second coming of a rabbit Disrupts the morning silence I think of you asleep miles away In clouded memories of fog Here in the snowy north, The temperature dropped to negative 25 Even the birds are silent, But the spruces still contemplate our Tiny backyard, unaware of our plights.

Place matters in the grand scheme  as we plan the rest of our short lives in between careers, births, and death, tracing the lines of worry and doubt on faces that age like earthen masks,  cracking and morphing into new forms  that recall our parents and their familiar tragedies and strategies in months that begin with archaic, internalized letters, fomenting lethargy and resilience like the graying maples and elms, the wintry oaks, the desolate brown topped spruce,  as those seasons change and loss becomes static reality in this Upper Peninsula, this region of utmost cold, where the snow falls and blankets the silent masses, ergo, a laugh, a sound, an eruption of jubilant life in resistance to the colors that drain, clamorously calling out for meaning.  Ha! Relentless ones! You are stuck here! Lift up your choices and dig in!

When I was a kid, my family and I would travel from Park Falls to Minocqua, Wisconsin to go shopping. On these trips, I would look out the window when I was not reading. We would drive an hour across State Highway 70 through the scenic Riley Lake Wildlife Management Area, a 1,252 area of bogs, spruce trees, and acidic Muskeg soil. I always distinctly remember the Tamarack bogs, where spindly yellow trees contrasted sharply with the green grass they grew past. Sometimes, I imagined these bogs would overtake the earth, spreading the thin trees across the globe, their full tops seemingly overshadowed by their lank trunks. Yet, somehow, they would overpower, despite great odds. These bogs contrasted sharply with conifer groves of blue spruce trees and balsams. Swatches of poplars were also common, as well as stands of maple and alder thickets. I marveled at the different trees and grasses and felt an affinity for the boggy landscape. I used to walk through similar bogs with my grandfathe...