Monday: the trees

I thought since I was visiting my hometown this week, I could write a little something about it every day that makes it special.

 

The road to my childhood home is canopied by muscular trunks of bark. The oaks are so dense, you can't wrap your arms all the way around them. Today I walked through the park that stretches from the front door to the horizon. Steve, Darcy and I laughed at squirrels and their litter of acorn shells all over our path. I smiled, crunching leaves under my feet, carefully side-stepping ones that were beautiful works of art. The path wound us around the pond, a social gathering of honking geese and chattering ducks, along with spouting fountains. “Ah, here we are!” Darcy said. Suddenly she resolved that we had reached a kind of unanticipated destination. Wherever it was we had set out to go, we had made it. She called them “rainbow trees,” and the scenery is a special showcase. Every blade of grass is appointed, as if it had surfaced by way of threaded needle. Darcy nodded approvingly at the placement and assortment of trees. Between the colors and differing stages of fall between each one, the rustle of leaves could have been self-praising applause. The light appeared in love with reaching for the ground by way of spilling off mossy branches. I had to sigh. I grew up in an ethereal fairyland.