Susan Lenfestey is a regular contributor. She lives in Lowry Hill.
Normally this is the time of year when I am in a post-Luminary Loppet glow, looking at photos of the candlelit evening like newlyweds poring over their wedding pictures and basking in the warmth of the community that made it happen.
But this year was different. Not just because the weather cooperated and Ice Henge and Ice Cropolis took hold on foot-thick lake ice, and the water-filled buckets and balloons froze into lanterns right on schedule, and the Enchanted Forest grew more ice mushrooms and hearts and flowers than ever before.
It was different because this was the year that ice fought ICE. The cruel boorishness of Metro Surge was met with resistance in many forms: protesting, protecting families, pursuing the goon squads and filming their assaults on innocent people, and with ice. Good Minnesota ice.
With a fresh snow cover and deep freeze temperatures, frozen lakes and lawns became our canvases, candles our brushes and the love of ice our secret sauce.
Hardy denizens of the luminary city spelled out messages on the lawn of the State Capitol and on lakes from Nokomis to Bde Maka Ska, holding candles and sometimes each other to form messages to the gods, or at least to passengers in planes lumbering overhead on their flight path to MSP: ICE OUT NOW. SOS. NO ICE.
Then there was the North Side Luminary Light Up, the brainchild of north side resident Brian Mogren, who transformed the summer garden beds in the Old Highland Peace Garden into winter beds of candlelit ice. More on Mogren’s efforts here.
Ice Artists Are a Unique Breed
The crew of ice makers at the Enchanted Forest, of which I am one, has always had a Zen-like synchronicity, quietly working on our own pieces in a common space and knowing that a hand or a tool will be given if needed. This year we worked with a different spirit, more reverent than festive, and with what I can only call love.
"We worked with a different spirit this year — more reverent than festive, and with what I can only call love."
That night thousands of people made their way past the ice tablets and memorials, up the hill of hearts, through the mushroom patch and past the field of frozen flowers and icy hands and a rising loon and miniature pyramids. Their faces reflected the same joy and reverence and love that we had put into creating them.
The Thaw
When we returned the next morning many of the candles were still burning. The thaw finally took its toll and the memorials melted away.
We in the luminary city are not fooled by a thaw. We know the ice is still on our lakes as surely as ICE is still in our streets. We know we cannot bake-sale our way out of this crisis. We need reparations from the federal government to pay for the economic damage inflicted by its illegal and costly incursion, and we know that will not happen.
But we also know we will defeat ICE by each of us doing what may feel like the tiniest part. Joined with the efforts of many, those small acts create a powerful whole, like the alchemy of turning water into ice, so clear that light shines through it and so strong we can stand on it together.
(Images: Courtney Cushing Kiernat, Brian Mogren and Susan Lenfestey)
