Midafternoon I put on my ski pants and stepped outside to go for a walk. There was foot-deep snow to tramp through by doing so, but I chose to head out behind our house rather than go onto the road where there could be traffic or through the yard where I could hear people talking. I wanted to be alone, so I put up with the snow in my boots and went first over to the hay bales on the hill, but not before standing still, facing the sun, as soon as I came out of the garden area that was shaded by trees.

What a gorgeous day. I’ve said this about three times already to Loverboy, and I’m not exaggerating. The light was just so, there wasn’t a whiff of wind, the snow was crisp and sparkling, and I felt like I was walking in the most beautiful place. My boots made so much noise I had to stop sometimes and stand still, simply to hear the silence, turn my face toward the sun and feel gratitude for being here.

My first stop was at the pasture where the six horses are, but today they were on the other side of the trees and did not come to the fence to see me. I walked north, past the bales and the machinery, and followed some ski-doo tracks into an open field past a row of snow-topped golden bales laid down in an arc.

The gold of sunlit, fresh bales is a favourite colour of mine.

Out in the field, I could see for miles in some directions and wished once again that I had the camera and could capture the incredible height and distance of the sky and trees and land. But no, even with the camera my skills would not be able to recreate the breathtakingness of what I saw today.

My feet kept poking through the snow as I walked, and I wondered if cross-country skis might be the answer to long-distance walking over snowy fields. That’d give my heart a good workout.

If only my little hound, Annie Doodle the Dumpling Dog, had been with me. It seemed that she was, in spirit. I miss her sometimes. She was a good friend.

After I’d turned around and wandered over to the fence one more time, in hopes that the horses might have moved closer by now, I glanced over to the north again and saw a sparkle at the tip of the bare branch of a tree. I watched for a minute or so and saw the light blink off and on several more times, then looked across the road and saw more of these twinkling lights at the tips of tree branches. They reminded me of white Christmas lights, only here it was the middle of the day and this little show seemed meant only for me. This is a phenomena I have never noticed before and it got me thinking about my dream the other night, the dream about being able to see auras.

It’s not that I have never seen auras. I can see the one closest to the body and to material things -- the white border next to the solid physical. But the only time I have consciously seen more colour than that was after doing a “blind” weekend, when the senses other than eyesight were stimulated more than usual. After my blindfold came off, I saw the neon pink of loving energy shooting out from our instructor.

Today as I watched the twinkling lights in the trees -- and I know it was just remnants of snow reflecting the sun -- I thought it might be nice if my dream came true and I became able to see auras better.