If there is anything to be found, waiting a half hour won't make any difference now. Still, after I've been looking I can't go back with the others. They always feel a need to talk. I can't blame them. I feel it too.
People feel uneasy when they are together like that and there is nothing but silence.
They feel like there is something they ought to be saying. I understand that. But I can't do it. So I search alone, looking down at the snow, moving slowly, worried I'll bury under my boot the thing I'm looking for. Worried that somehow I already have.