My days have felt focused and scattered, frenetic and flattened, too short and too long. Trying to hang on to my balance in the swirl of events I’ve been living through lately, I’ve found walking the evening into dusk and then darkness has helped a lot. I grind through the day getting what must be done done, or whacking away at some item on the long list of things I thought would have been done long ago, but aren’t. Suddenly the day is almost over and a walk lit by the last of the light has been seeming just right.
A favorite track crosses the hay field at the top of Harmony Hill, then follows a trail into Northwood Meadows State Park, making a loop around the pond. Yesterday the evening light turned rose as the clouds picked up color from the setting sun and the pine needles along the trail fired into a deep orange. The pond reflected the changing light, from pink to gray to the last of the day’s blue. Walking back to the car the trees were black and the path was white, drawing my attention to exactly where it should be, right there, right then, right now.
Grace Mattern 