A surprise sprinkling of snow drifted in before sunrise, soft and quiet as a held breath. Just a dusting – the kind that doesn’t quite stick but still turns the world silvery for a blink. The air held that hush that only snow brings, a sound thinner than silence. Later, as twilight settled in, the flakes returned again, swirling in streetlight cones like ash from some secret celestial fire.

Tonight the thermometer’s on its way down to 26°, sharp enough to remind the trees to tighten their bark and the rest of us to reach for another blanket. You could almost taste winter on the wind – the clean edge of it.

Stopped by to see the Salem RidgeYaks today – yes, actual yaks, shaggy and serene, standing like misplaced clouds in the pasture. Their coats are thick as storybook winter, long bangs hanging over calm, curious eyes. They move slow, deliberate, as if time itself runs a little gentler around them.

Some folks say they don’t really belong here – that yaks aren’t native to the Blue Ridge at all, that they’re creatures of the Himalayas, not these soft Virginia hills. Maybe that’s true, but looking at them under the gray November sky, with the mountains rising behind like folded blue paper, they seem right at home. Far be it for me to deny any creature welcome to this place.

The cold wind lifts their fur; they blink, unbothered. The ridges breathe mist, and for a moment it’s easy to believe the world fits together in ways that make quiet sense.

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