For Love of Frozen Water is the sixth in a series of essays on the Spirit of Water by the Water Stewards II. Published in the Marquette Monthly February, 2025.
– Michael Lynn Wellman, PhD
As I sit down to write this, the first snows have finally arrived. After a long autumn, winter’s arrival has been sudden and has yet to let up. The kid in me is giddy for all the play to come, while the adult in me stresses about the endless to-dos before camp gets snowed in for the winter.
With age, I find that winter has increasingly become my favorite season. I love the permission to rest after the long days and hard work-play of summer. I love the opportunity for contemplation and introspection. I love the quiet, the stillness, the solitude. More than anything, I love the snow.
I am the type of person for whom the more snow, the better. I spent a decade out West seeking deep snowy winters. In the winter of 2010-2011, we regularly skied waist-deep powder as the Wasatch Mountains of Utah received over 700 inches of snow. In the winter of 2017-2018, we survived “Miracle March,” when Tahoe received over 300 inches in March alone. The promise of a deep snowpack is part of what lured me to settle here in the UP.
As a self-professed backcountry powder skier, there is nothing better than skiing powder. The interplay of light, fluffy frozen water, earth, and gravity allows humans the faintest taste of what it must be like to fly. It is one of those few places where I’ve most deeply connected with spirit, where I’ve experienced the state described as “flow,” “peak,” and “near-life,” the space where one is almost fully alive. As deep ecologist Dolores LaChapelle elegantly said,
“Powder snow skiing is not fun. It is life, fully lived, life lived in a blaze of reality. What we experience in powder is the original human self, which lies deeply inside each of us, still undamaged in spite of what our present culture tries to do to us. Once experienced, this kind of living is recognized as the only way to live — fully aware of the earth and the sky and the gods and you, the mortal, playing among them.”
Recently, I’ve been noticing myself jealous of those with the “Water-Winter Wonderland” license plate. Not only do I find that I desire to represent the colors of my alma mater, but I also notice I feel a deep pride in living in a place that can rightfully claim to be a winter wonderland.
At the same time, as these first seasonal snowflakes fall upon my face, I notice I feel apprehension, anxiety, even despair. I wonder if this winter will follow the trend of the past few winters. Could it be a repeat of last winter, when we received one of the lowest snow totals on record? Or the previous winter, when mild temperatures persisted into mid-winter? Or the previous winter, when early winter rains decimated the snow base?
What does it mean to live in a “water-winter wonderland” amidst a changing climate? As someone who grew up downstate, I am intimately familiar with living in a place that no longer consistently receives snow. No more sledding, snow tunnels, or snowball fights. Kids today are at a loss for what I grew up experiencing. And I fear for my own children. I desperately want them to grow up falling in love with a snowy winter wonderland the way I did.
Whether we like it or not, we are experiencing the effects of this changing winter wonderland in real time. Ski resorts unable to open until mid-winter. Nordic ski marathons shortened and rerouted. Winter carnival schedule changed last minute. Dog sled races cancelled multiple years in a row. Ice climbing festivals cancelled. Telemark ski festivals moved to alternate locations. A whole winter with no powder skiing.
These changes not only diminish our outdoor recreation practices but also have very real impacts on our local economies and ecologies. In a place that depends on winter tourism, an unreliable snowpack means fewer tourists. It also means less water flowing downstream in the warmer months. As we experienced on the Yellow Dog River this summer, last winter’s lack of snow led to one of the lowest water levels in memory, even after an abundance of springtime rain. Nothing holds water like a deep snowpack.
As a water protector, I have a duty to protect this frozen water. For myself and my love of backcountry powder skiing. For my children and future generations of winter enthusiasts. For this place, this water-winter wonderland we call home.
– Michael Lynn Wellman, PhD
Michael Lynn Wellman, PhD, is a father, husband, companion, and land tender who lives on the Yellow Dog River with his wife, two kids, and two shepskies, where together they are creating a place of educational retreat and spiritual sanctuary.
