by jphilo | Apr 20, 2009 | Walking Down the Gravel Road
Usually, when I walk along our gravel road, its beauty captivates me. But this weekend, I saw again the dark side of our road during the annual spring ditch walk. Armed with gloves and trashabgs, we gathered with our neighbors in the driveway of the family that organizes the event each year. They divided us into groups and we fanned out along the entire length of our road, and along the long stretch that leads to the city airport and the National Guard Headquarters.
The amount of garbage we collected this year was staggering. The bed of the pick up was heaped with old tires, a tail pile and other assorted car parts, a humidifier and a huge mound of garbage bags. We picked up fast food containers, beverage bottles, cans, cardboard boxes, countless cigarette packages and cigarette butts, old gloves, ripped clothing, and gallon jugs.
The most interesting items of the day were a pair of women’s underpants and, further down the road, a flyer about how to pick up women, and a little beyond that, a size nine White Stag women’s dressy sandal. I’m praying there’s no connection amongst the three.
When we were done, I rode back with my neighbors. “Take a good look now, “ one of them said. “By tomorrow there will be garbage again.” He was right. This morning someone’s discarded french fries littered the gravel by the bridge, the most beautiful stretch of the road we all love so much.
My heart sank, not because of the french fries which the birds will make short work of today, but because of people so blind to beauty. If they saw the loveliness surrounding them, I know they wouldn’t use our road or any road for a garbage can. So they must be blind. My heart sinks when I think of the despair that is their lives. For what must existence be like for those who can’t see the simple gift of beauty?
by jphilo | Apr 13, 2009 | Walking Down the Gravel Road
Since when did April become such a coy, little tease? All weekend, she tantalized us with springtime temperatures and sunshine, the minx. Saturday morning, her soft, breezy fingers caressed our cheeks and lured us to Ledges State Park. We tramped along the trails, while the buds swelled on the trees. The Des Moines River, blue and tempting, glimmered through the naked tree limbs.
On Sunday, the trip to the Easter brunch was chilly, but when the worship service ended we carried our coats into the sunshine. Anne and I heeded April’s siren call and took a walk before our company arrived for dinner. All day, the sun smiled and winked. The lawn tossed her green hair this way and that until we were sure spring was here to stay.
By bedtime, April had me right where she wanted me. All night I dreamt of warm days, leafy green trees along our gravel road, grilled meat and vegetables, and supper on the sun porch. Then, when I walked this morning, April pulled the rug out from under me – or more accurately, she piled it on top of me. It started to snow. She raked my cheeks with her icy nails and laughed with delight. “Sucker,” she whispered on the wind as she danced away. “Fooled you again.”
I’m older, wiser, and colder than before our weekend fling. From now on, I’m weather pessimist – suspicious, distrustful and crabby – as long as April hangs around. She broke my heart once, but if she thinks she’ll do it again, she’s wrong.
Stay away from me, April. Find some other gullible wretch to tease, you little tramp. But leave me alone, wrapped in my misery and my winter coat, until spring is here to stay.
by jphilo | Apr 8, 2009 | Walking Down the Gravel Road
Thirty-two degrees and a slight breeze makes for a chilly morning, so I waited to walk until the sun was bright enough warm my back and seriously damage the remaining snow cover and, hopefully, warm my back. This April day I look ready for Christmas, stuffed into my down-filled coat, a scarf tied around my neck and over my hat, thick gloves covering my hands.
The sun is April strong, but this morning I doubted it’s power until a cardinal’s song lifted my eyes from the cold road beneath my feet. I searched the treetops and found him perched near the top of a neighbor’s tall tree, on the crest of the hill. Sunlight bounced off the small bird’s feathers, and he glowed, dazzling bright against the spring sky.
The little bird sang, oblivious of the cold, warmly dressed in his down-filled coat and pointy feathered hat. Had he been singing since sunrise? Or did he wait until he could serenade the pitiable, earthbound humans walking on his road? Whatever his reason for being there, the glow of his feathers against the intense blue sky and the buds swelling on the branches gave me what I needed – beauty beyond description and patience to wait for the warmer days ahead.
by jphilo | Mar 31, 2009 | Walking Down the Gravel Road
The wind has been fierce off and on all month, proof positive that the authors and illustrators of my elementary school Dick and Jane books knew what they were talking about. Their spring pictures of windblown Dick and Jane struggling against gales that turned their umbrellas inside out, fascinated me. How, I wondered, could the wind do that to their umbrellas but not lift Jane’s skirt and reveal her undies? The lack of attention given to the undie scenario, much more common than ruined umbrellas, destroyed my faith in the Dick and Jane authors, though I still coveted Jane’s wavy blond hair and full-skirted dresses.
My windy day fears have increased with age. They’ve become more expensive, too. Will the silver maple drop on the house before the lawn dries out enough for the tree guys to come? Is the shingle I found in the yard yesterday an indication of the state of our roof which was redone not that long ago? What will my husband say when he sees where the wind tore the second story rain gutter loose? When will the wind die down enough so he can safely climb his new Little Giant ladder and fix it?
When I walked this morning, I stepped over the worries the wind deposited on the doorstep and went down the road. I leaned against the wind as it pushed me down the road. I breathed a sigh of relief when I descended the hill and reached the sheltered stretch of road where the wind didn’t reach. There by the bridge, amidst the grey tree trunks and bare branches, the willow tree stood still and faintly green. It was for me the first and slightest sign that winter will soon end, the wind will calm, and new life waits just beyond what I can see.
New, as yet undetectable worries wait beside them, I’m sure. But for now, the promise of spring gives me strength to walk past the worries to find the grace waiting in this windblown day.
by jphilo | Mar 16, 2009 | Walking Down the Gravel Road
This morning, I checked the forecast: sunny and highs in the sixties. Bright and early, not wanting to miss a minute of such optimistic weather, I strapped on my camera and lugged the tripod on my walk, determined to photograph the cardinals I’d seen and heard everywhere the day before.
The dawn was grey at first, the sun not even visible. Twenty minutes later, when the sun finally woke up and showed itself, the tripod had worn out it’s welcome, and the camera was a lead weight. Apparently the cardinals are still adjusting to Daylight Savings Time, because it was another twenty minutes before they woke up.
By then I’d wrestled with the tripod and camera twice – once to photograph a red-headed woodpecker on a telephone pole, and again to capture some wrens setting up housekeeping in a bluebird house up the road a ways. Finally, outside my kitchen door at the end of my walk, a cardinal began singing from the top of our neighbor’s giant spruce.
The tripod, now an experienced traveler, waited patiently while I mounted the camera and started snapping.
One bright red bird, small but able to fill the enormous blue sky with song, reminded me of the tasks on my to do lists this week. I am too small to complete them. They are too elusive for me to capture. But they are the song I’ve been given by the Creator of birds and sky.
In His hand, I can sing.
by jphilo | Feb 16, 2009 | Walking Down the Gravel Road
The temperature was twenty-one degrees when I walked this morning, pretty typical for mid-February. What wasn’t typical was the spider scurrying across the road. Without a coat and socks – who can afford a four pack of socks anyway? – he had to be cold. Those exoskeletons don’t come with much insulation.
What was he doing on our road in the middle of February other than blowing all my winter paradigms to bits? Had he fallen from a passing car? Or maybe I hadn’t seen him hitch a ride outside on my shoe. However he got on the road, he was in a hurry. I watched him scuttle about three feet. Then he stopped long enough for me to snap a picture and went on his way again. The cold didn’t seem to slow him down much.
February does strange things to man and beast. The days grow longer, the sun gains strength, and it fools everyone into thinking spring is right beyond the horizon, on the other side of the road. With the warm sun on your back, you hurry across and find a chilly snowbank and another month of winter.
I hope the spider finds a cozy crevice below the frost line before tomorrow’s winter storm arrives. Otherwise he’ll be frozen in time. The thought makes me sad, but not enough to rent him a corner in basement until the frost leaves the ground. Just melancholy and wistful enough to feel sorry for a spider.
February certainly does strange things to man and beast.
