June 2023

Dirt and gravel and ruts and prayers

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“My road is dirt and gravel and ruts and prayers, it’s terrifying in the winter and so beautiful your heart hurts in the fullness of summer.”

I wrote those words for a digital essay I did about my house.

The same road I hate in the winter, I love this time of year — particularly early mornings when the mist is still settled in the lowlands and the tall grasses sparkle in the light of rising sun. Inevitably, there will be deer with their fawns. I forget that deer are not a daily occurrence for all folks. Beautiful creatures and the little ones too make your heart hurt with their youth and beauty. There are rabbits and I can hear the peepers in the pond. If I’m lucky, the flock of wild turkey will make an appearance. They are so ugly they are beautiful – especially the Old Tom who has lived a pugilistic life to keep his harem. He struts with pride and the ladies and their young’uns follow.

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A Faithful Old Dog

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If my body were a puppy, I would love it.  I would love it through the rumble tumble time.  I would love it when it chewed up my shoes, and I would love it all snuggled up in blankets while I read a book.  I would smile at its bark and savor the kisses.

Photo by Michael Cummins on Unsplash

I would tickle its fat little tummy and laugh.

If my body were a mountain, it would be an Appalachian and not a Rocky.  All mounds and curves, nothing jagged. 

If my body were an infant, I would feed it when hungry and rock it to sleep.

If my body were a tree, I would marvel at the changes the years would bring.

If my body were a leaf, it would be from an oak. Ordinary for its place and time, but still a miracle to be in awe of.

If my body were a creek, it would start out as a trickle growing and growing until it needed to release the overflow to something larger than itself.

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Montage

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I’m standing on the beach at Kaneohe Air Station.  I’m 9. The wind blows my hair, and the sun has warmed the smooth lava beneath my feet. The sky is blue but also filled with clouds and the ever-present Hawaiian rainbow. The tidepools are full after the liquid sunshine that we called the short rains of a typical Hawaiian day. I am alone and reveling in my newfound freedom. I am allowed to roam. And I do. I pick my way…

Down the aisle of the school bus. He is sitting on the back bench. I think he is saving a seat for me. We will hold sweaty hands too shy to look at one another…

I look up and see my first love ambling down the street carrying a large heart-shaped box of Whitman chocolates. I scramble down the apple tree and race to him, engulfing and engulfed in a hug as expansive as…

The back pasture of a farm in East Lynn. The hay is green, and the Appalachian sky is crystalline it’s so clear. Again, I am alone. I am free to roam, but my life allows so few alone times that I relish them. The daisies, nearly three feet tall, are blooming. I have a paper due but I’m in love with…

The passion of my life. We stand on the pier at Okauchee Lake. He towers over me. His piercing blue eyes soft for once and the cold night whipping his dark hair around. He leans down to kiss me after I say yes and his beard scratches my face, but I love it. I love him, but we don’t marry. Fate intervenes and…

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