Friday Ramble - Drifting

On cooler September mornings, the village is a mysterious place. The earth is warmer than the air above it, the meeting of the two elements turning otherwise mundane landscape features into otherworldly entities, fey and luminous. Autumn is just over the hill, comfortable in her tenure of mist, rain, wind and madcap tumbling leaves.

There is nothing like a good fog, and September dishes up some splendid atmospheric murks. Mist swirls around everything, draping the whiskery trees, smoothing hard edges and rounding the contours of house and street. The north wind scours foliage from the old trees near home, and it rustles pleasingly underfoot as Beau and I go along on our early walks. Irv loved this time of the year, and he is always with us. If we listen carefully, we can sometimes hear Cassie and Spencer pottering along beside us too, their happy feet doing a kind of scuffling dance through the falling leafy treasure.

Out of the pearly gray and sepia come sounds now and again. Birds converse in hedgerows and geese move unseen among the clouds, singing as they pass over our heads. Doors open and close as sleepy residents collect their morning papers. There is the soft growling of automobiles and the rumble of buses, the muffled cadence of joggers gliding through the park, the footsteps of commuters heading downtown to work. Once in a while, there is the whistle of a faraway train, just a faint echoing in the air.

The academic year has already begun at some schools in the village, and on morning walks, Beau and I see children on their way to class, walked there by parents and siblings, sometimes the family dog, and once or twice, the family cat. The kids chatter like young birds, as brightly plumed as finches in their rainbow leggings and anoraks, carrying umbrellas and backpacks almost as big as they are. Nearing home, raindrops beat a staccato rhythm on roofs, and little rivers sing through the eaves. Taken all together, our early outings are uplifting and downright symphonic.

 

On such mornings, the world seems boundless, brimming with lucent, floating Zen possibility, soil and trees and sky and mist giving tongue in a language that is wild and compelling. Part of me is curled up in a slow breathing meditation, counting my breaths, in and out, in and out. Other parts are out there drifting along in the fog with my companions and happy to be doing so. It's all good. Happy September!