February 7, 2015 - 00:07
I think I like ice alot more than snow. Snow is pretty and all, but all it really does is slow me down. Ice can be potentially life-threatening, but that's the fun of it. It gives me a nice rush. Walking through the labyrinth today, I had to switch between walking on fresh ground, ice, and snow. Snow and fresh ground are just too predictable though. I never knew when I was stepping on ice, but even if I did it was still interesting to see whether I could keep my balance or slip. At times, it felt like that moment when you're climbing into a bounce house with only socks on. The other great thing about ice is its ability to keep the shape that it was frozen in. Rewalking the path again, I saw a couple of my footprints from the last time I walked through. There was something really gratifying about being able to place my foot in the footprint and having it match exactly. I wish i went during the day so I could have seen if it was actually my footprint or someone elses.
This walk was one of the most calming I've had since I've been visiting. There was nothing that was clouding my mind, except fleeting thoughts that were coming too quickly for me to remember them. I also noticed that for most my walk that I had been staring at the ground the whole time. Even when I tried to switch to looking around me, there was nothing to look at, except a couple of trees. The ground was more interesting to me partly because I wanted to make sure I knew what I was stepping on and because there are so many elevation changes on the path that could cause me to end up with some injuries. Also, a nice surprise was discovering that in the middle that there are four triangles in the ground that point outward, resembling a compass. It was too dark to take a picture, but it was strange how they weren't even directly in the middle of the center of the labyrinth nor were the symetrically aligned. Maybe they were shifted somehow, but it was so unpleasant to look at. I don't even think they were pointing in correct cardinal directions, Why are they there?