Continued The Correspondent
Merry Christmas. I’m alone this year. Bruce and Fiona are in Belgium, which is good. You know, that’s good for them to be there.
I went for a walk this morning before the rain started.
When I woke up I knew it was going to rain because the scent of it was so strong, so I went on out in my boots.
It wasn’t too cold. The sky was dark gray and moving quickly.
I walked on down toward the river along the path.
Have I ever described the path to you? I don’t know that I’ve ever written it down at all. I love to go down the path by myself.
You cross the street from my driveway and there is a magnolia as tall as two light poles, and beside it is a little opening you might not notice if you were passing by, but there it is.
You tuck in and then you’re in the trees.
In winter it’s rather easier, whereas in the thick of summer it’s much more like walking into a tunnel made by dryads, but anyway you walk in and then the path becomes clear after a few feet.
There are others on the street who use the path, and sometimes the boys from the neighborhood behind will come through with their fishing poles and tackle boxes and use the path.
I love to see that. It reminds me of the past when everything was right, you know that way boys walk, heads down, strong backs, kicking at the ground.
But you walk through and the trees are all skinny and tall and there is one massive old oak, which fell, oh, maybe fifteen years ago now during a big storm, and it’s just there along the path and you have to go around it or over it, and I go around it now.
It’s covered with a thick, bright green moss and lichen the color of those light mint Tic Tacs and usually you see some little thing or another scurrying around, like chipmunks or birds.
Once there was a robin who had her nest there in the corner of a branch.
She had her nest there for a few years, but then one morning it was gone, probably a fox.
Anyway, I like to pass the fallen oak and see all the things to which it generously plays the host, letting all sorts feast. That old tree just makes me feel good.
A bit past the tree there’s a steep climb down to the water level, but there are some roots and stones that give me purchase, and I take a walking stick typically.
I forgot to mention that, my walking stick.
I found it some years ago now, there off the path.
There is moss rather all the way down along the edges, and it’s just this beautiful green, and then you’re down at the edge of the river, and there is the gray moving water.
I love to see it. The river, and the journey down, and then I walk along for a while, usually.
I’ll fish trash out from the edges sometimes and tuck it in my pocket.
Sometimes I see herons. It smelled cold this morning, and rainy, and there’s of course the briny must of the water, that smell, and the rotting trunks and leaves from the fall, and I love all of this, but it’s melancholy, too, in a way.
It’s hard to explain it exactly, but it is gorgeous and melancholy all at once.
I won’t be able to see it, at some point, and when I can’t see it I won’t be able to go down there alone, which is really the only way I like to go down at all.
A companion would spoil it, I think, though of course you’d be welcome to come along.
I like to go down to get away from everything man-made and I feel like I’m far out in the wild, and then I find I can think.
Anyway, by the time I got back up to the house I was ready for a cup of tea and writing some letters, and later I’ll make a cherry pie and take it over for dinner with Trudy and Millie.
Millie’s husband is dead, and Trudy’s been divorced longer than me.
We’ll play cards and listen to Christmas records. Millie has an ancient record player.