Snow
DESCRIPTION
Let’s carry out a thought experiment. Let’s imagine a snow crystal, one of those wonderful structures that arise in some cloud or other at a temperature below the freezing point. Water vapour has collected around a particle of dust, a spore or a bacterium. It is so cold that water molecules do not remain liquid around the condensation nucleus, but crystallize immediately. More and more molecules join together. Crystals grow and grow in a way that diminishes their mutual repulsion and increases their mutual attraction as much as possible. This creates the many beautiful symmetrical forms in which snowflakes fall to earth from the sky. On this journey they are blown to and fro by the wind, collide with other snow crystals, are diverted and redirected, pass through layers of warmer air, and sooner or later drift gently down to the ground. Here they lie, and become part of a greater whole, enveloping the mountain landscape and shaping it, bringing out the contrasts.