Finding Freedom in the Parting of the Ways

Paths by Julie Shafer

The snow resembled a dusting of powdered sugar across the vegetation and terrain of the Central Wyoming Plains. It was so brilliantly white, and evenly distributed it’s as if the sky was a sifter; each second a turn of the handle releasing more powder to drift through a mesh screen. I was as evenly dusted as the terrain- from above I’d be imperceptible save the footprints I’d left behind. Behind me was a sinuous trail, in front of me fresh, unadulterated white powder with scraggly sagebrush poking out here and there, and tufts of sallow prairie grass. I could see the final destination but couldn’t see how to get there. A signpost near the trailhead indicated that there is indeed a path to Devil’s Gate, though there had been no trace of one then and no trace of one now. I had forged my own way forward, and if falling in holes, and tripping over sagebrush was the goal, then I’d won ten times over.

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