The other day

I saw a man in the canal on a boat. His boat was old, and moved laboriously and slowly. In his hand was a long bamboo pole, the end of which was affixed with a looped wire, and around this was woven a mesh, so as to create a kind of net. He leaned carefully out to starboard as I passed, and gingerly tried to fish the large lump of icey snow out of the water. Maybe it was a snowman who had been pushed in. The weather was warmer now- indeed no other trace of ice or sub zero temperature was evisent, in the river or on the path on which I walked. The sun had crept out from behind the evaporating grey cloud cover that had occupied the city for the last week. On the whole, it was feeling much warmer. As I turned the corner, I looked back to see how he was getting on. He was nearly ashore, one arm on the tiller of the motor, the other straining to hold the leverage of the snow at the end of the long bamboo. He dumped the snow onto the bank, then turned his boat back out into the canal, looking for more work to occupy the rest of his day. The sun shone brightly for the rest of my walk home.