An Opening

My dog Lola makes my decision for me. Torn between driving to Second Lake to skate or climbing under my covers with a book, I catch my pup's eyes, choose a third option, and head outside layered for the brutal North wind that haunts Seward.

I walk towards the lower waterfall, now an ice fall, but instead of staying on the bear trail that heads up hill, I find myself walking into the brush with no set destination in mind.

I stop a couple times and lasso my mind to the moment, pulling it off my treadmill of worry to the moss and dried leaves at my feet. The Spruce and Hemlock and Alder that stand by my side. The blue sky above.

Be here, I say to myself, be here.

Within seconds, I'm gone again, worried about the election, about Covid, about Elias, about school, about the election that unfolds as I climb over an old log, duck under a branch.

I stop again.

Be where you are Christy--in these woods, older and wiser than your unsettled human brain.

I come to a thick patch of Devil's Club and need to bend and stretch my way through to avoid the thorns.

Don't we all? Don't we all need to flex and duck and rise to avoid the daggers in life regardless of where we lie? Don't we all need to step away from the trail and take a moment to discover where we are? Don't we all get lost inside our own scattered minds?

I stumble upon a squirrel's home stockpiled for winter, preparing for the long days and months ahead. Lola sticks her nose in one of the holes and I wonder what it looks like beneath the ground. Do squirrel families snuggle together as the wind blows? Do they disagree and turn their backs on each other? Do they forget that they need each other? Do they?

Do I need to gather supplies--courage, community, creativity---for the long days and months ahead? What will the darkness bring? Who will we be when its over?

I find the remains of an old backpack, half buried, deteriorated, frozen to the ground. I touch the worn fabric riddled with holes. What troubles did the owner of this green pack carry? What hopes and fears? What victories and losses? Did my fellow traveler ever feel lost while only a few yards from home?

Not that I'm lost. I'm between the ridge to Spruce Creek, my house, the bog, and the rise to Foundry Peak. I've just never been here before, in this particular thicket, within the forest I call home.

And I can't see a clear path through.

I've never been in this historical moment of time, with all our political uncertainty, oppression, and unrest amid a worldwide pandemic, and the pervasive denial that any of it exists.

And I can't see a clear path through.

I just keep bushwacking-- climbing over moss-covered Hemlock logs, weaving around the gauntlet of Devil's Club, lifting Spruce branches away from my face, breaking old Alder limbs in my way--until I see a ray of light ahead, that hints at an opening.

A way forward.

A way through.

Will we all find a way forward? 

A way through?

Comments

[Valerie Demming]

Christy...I really like the part about the devils club and the picture that it paints.

[Christy]

Thank you Valerie, I often feel as though I'm weaving my way through it, especially this year.