Still Here

I'm still here.

Last Wednesday's sunshine and warmish weather beckoned me into the out of doors after work. It was Earth Day. The Webster Arboretum isn't far from home, but the trees and flowers were not in full bloom, so I drove on. The lake, choppy and rough, provided no beach on which to search pebbles and bits of glass. I drove farther down Lake Road. The Webster Park Campground is not yet open for the season, but the road to the woods called my name and I thought I might take a step or two down one of the muddy, sunlit trails... 

Fresh, bright green leaves tinged the trees. Miniature carpets of moss made patchwork carpets on fallen logs. Birds twittered. Squirrels chirped. I stepped over sticks, stones and puddles, capturing photos along the way.

The hidden path, skirting the gulley's rim, was more difficult to discern last week, but having walked this way on autumn days, its invisibility only served to draw me in. Tension melted from my body as the fresh, cool smell of woodsy moss and pine filled each breath. 

Early spring. Too soon for the buzz and bite of deer flies and mosquitoes. Each blade of grass and tree branch born anew. I hadn't intended to walk the hidden trail but was grateful for each step and every sign of growth.

Just before the crest of the hill, a fairy house appeared. The door stood somewhat ajar. I smiled to myself and imagined fairy children hiding in the shadows, shushed by a wary, fairy mother. Not wanting to terrify the tiny creatures, I snapped a picture and hurried on, almost certain I'd heard them breathe a sigh of relief.

Behind the park maintenance buildings, I broke from the path and made my way toward the park road where my sisters and I, in days of childhood, ran ahead of our parents on our way back to the campsite. 

Some of my favorite memories are the afternoon walks we took with Mom and Dad when we camped at the little park back in the 1970s. The woods have changed since then. Many old pine trees, planted in long straight rows by boy scouts many years before I was born, lay fallen on the forest floor. The ground is no longer an open carpet of pine needles, and the tall pines that once created a shadowy, forest canopy are few. Smaller trees have taken their place, and the underbrush has filled in much of the open spaces where we ran and played, but it's still the woods and it still whispers my name.