A Seasonal Meditation

We were out in the dying light late yesterday, and in the new light of this gray New England morning.  We were walking.  Walking and thinking and reflecting.  I do some of my best writing this way.

Steve Smith, the author of several White Mountain guide books and a friend of ours, takes copious notes when out on a trail.  A section of his home is devoted to decades of tiny notebooks filled with his scratched observations.  We once compared writing habits and he was surprised that I do not take notes on a hike.  Instead I walk with Atticus and Nature and a theme is delivered to me. I ruminate on it and allow myself to actually feel it.  I bring that gift home with me to my writing table.  That's how it is when we hike, and now when we are hiking less and walking more.  This is how I write. 

Recently, while corresponding with a friend, I shared some experiences Atticus and I are going through that are new for us.  We have been discussing the aging process and how I notice signs that things are different for my friend.  As he ages we change the way we do certain things.  We grow together, even as he gets older.  So while his physical limitations accrue, so do the gifts of the experience of this friendship and shared love and life. 

I've come to realize that most of the mountains we've come to know intimately - the mountains who have helped shape our identity and this bond - will never see the two of us together again.  There will come a day when I return to them, but Atticus won't be with me. 

Fortunately, there is so much more he and I share than just our love of mountains.  We still enjoy our walks; our visits with the cool running waters of streams, brooks, and rivers; sitting on the side of a trail to catch our breath and let the setting of Nature catch up to us; and just being at one with Nature, or in our little home.  Atticus is supportive of Will by being understanding and patient.  But where Atticus thrives is when it's just the two of us out on an adventure either big or small.  Away from man made noise, and wrapped in the sounds of sighing trees, birds singing, chipmunks chirping, the grumble of bears we sometimes encounter, and of course, the rustling of leaves overhead and now underfoot as they fall from the trees.

Old age delivers lessons for us to learn together.  It's one thing to take in an aged Will at fifteen; it's entirely different to pay attention as Atticus ages before my eyes.  It's a process and together we handle it as a team.  I prefer to consider it a new mountain range to traverse.  

Walking through corridors of colored trees and watching a handful drift carelessly down upon us, spiraling to a quiet resting place to create new life in coming years; it’s easy to think of the passage of time. Of life and death.  There will come a day Atticus will die.  There will come a time when I do as well.  It’s something none of us can escape.  I learned this at an early age and I tend not to obsess about it, although I understand most other people do.  For some reason I do not fear death.  The adventurer in me thinks of it as a mysterious new beginning.

This was my contemplation while enjoying the glory of leaves as we strolled along the solitude of a country road, the only sound being the three crows who were following us from tree to tree and calling out their pleasantries or obscenities.  In the autumn we get a great lesson of how graceful that passage from life to death can be.  It's natural.     

When we returned home this morning I responded to a friend’s letter and wrote something I’ll share here with you as well. 

"Those we love, after all, are never really gone.  We may not be able to touch them any longer, but they can touch us and most likely always will." 

But death will have to wait, for today we live.  I don't mind visiting with it in my thoughts now and again, but these are the days for living.  I know that by the way Will is doing his best to jump up on me as I bring food to his dish.  He doesn't get very far off the ground with those two front paws.  He's more like a wind-up toy.  Yet his exuberance makes up for what his physical abilities lack.

So it's onward we go.  Onward, by all means.