I’m sure I’m not the first one to write about this, even on this blog, but it’s worth saying again: Never underestimate the value of a nice walk as part of the writing process.

Now that I have a dog again, I actually get out and go on walks, no matter what the weather is. It’s not that I didn’t want to pre-dog, but there were always other things to do most of the time. My dog, Willow, doesn’t care if I have other things to do. So, we walk.

If you don’t go out for a daily walk, I recommend it. Whether you’re writing or not. It’s a great way to reset your head, and the stream of conscioiusness that naturally comes with a walk is great for generating writing ideas.

One of my favorite walks in town has always been the road carved out of the woods along the lake on land that once belonged to the majestic Belgrade Hotel. It burned down in 1959 (definitely a blog post for another day), and the land was quickly subdivided by its relieved owner, who’d been in financial trouble.

It’s always a joy to me how in my town and so many in Maine, even right in town there can be woods, thck and tangled, strewn with downed trees and giant rocks. Woods play a part in the book I’m writing now, and if I weren’t taking that walk, even though I’ve spent a lot of time in the woods of Maine and know all about the thickness, the tangledness, and all that, I don’t know if I’d be getting it quite right if I didn’t get out there and experience it. The experience includes the subtle parts, like how even on a placid day, a previous night’s snow will drift down from the evergreen bows. Or the variety of types of tree. How winter reveals views that you forget all about when leaves are on the trees.

When Willow and I took a walk down the road the other day, there were a few inches of fresh snow from the night before. The morning was intoxicatingly quiet, at least to me. Willow’s satellite-dish ears, though, rotated to sounds I could only imagine. She hear something, stop, look into the woods, sometimes with a soft “woof.” Sometimes pulling on the leash to go see. I held firm, though. That snow can cover a lot of ankle-breaking hazards.

The new covering, though, revealed to me, with my inferior senses, the animal tracks that Willow always knows are there snow or none: rabbits, deer, that fox who we see walking through the yard many mornings. It’s tracks show it’s marching from the woods around one lake, to those around the other, across the village.

Willow and I take a walk in the woods.

A lack of tracks in the snow are also telling. Even the summer people who are clever enough to have their driveways plowed during the winter can’t don’t have a trick for making it look like someone’s living there this time of year. Willow and I like to assess who only comes for the sun and warmth, and misses this glorious time of year. On this road, it’s about two-thirds of the homes.

Old vestiges of the hotel property remain. For instance, I’d been curious about a small raised rock foundation in the middle of a plot of woods. A friend who’s also president of the town’s historical society told me recently that it’s not a foundation, but part of an evated tee for the hotel’s old golf course. It’s intriguing, how it’s now surrounded by tangled woods, including giant Eastern pine and balsam.

We always stop and look through the trees at the old golf tee, one of the many acre or so plots along the road where there’s no house. I always wonder who owns that land. If they’ll ever build on it, or that old golf tee will sit there for another 100 years.

“Whose woods these are?” I asked Willow on our walk the other day. “I think I know. His house is in the village though. He will not see me stopping here, to watch his woods fill up with snow.”

Willow, as usual, was unimpressed with my recall of poems memorized half a century ago. [Note to the younger folks: Before screens, social media and streaming, we used to entertain ourselves by memorizing poems. They never leave your brain.]

My favorite lines of that poem fit, too. At least the first half: “Between the woods and frozen lake, the darkest evening of the year.”

My second-favorite two lines are also fitting on this day: “The only other sound’s the sweep of easy wind and downy flake.”

I always thought the poem ended too soon, always a little disappointed with the ending. All of those promises to keep, miles to go, and everything, instead of just enjoying the quiet woods.

In any case, as we walked along, Willow sniffing the animal tracks, me reciting the poem in time to our steps, a new scene for my book emerged in its entirety. Funny how that can happen with a poem going through your head. Must be the invigorating winter air, the towering trees, the easy wind and downy flake.