Fragments From Floyd

The sun will be up soon, and we will be heading off for our morning walk. We are now one season removed from summer and our lives have taken on a different character, a seriousness not familiar in June.

A June morning walk is a casual and spontaneous amble in no particular hurry to go or to come back. We follow our usual loop down the pasture road. We step across the creek on the dry boulders in the shade of arching Rhododendrons. There is no urgency or hurry to it. We wind our way home north along the logging road, and use our hiking sticks to keep us from slipping in the wet grass, stopping now and then to note a new arrival in the calendar of budding and blooming things. The still bright air is heavy with the familiar smells of warm earth, fields and woods, and a hundred birds sing about themselves from high in tulip poplars sprouting tiny leaves. At the end of our walk, the path downhill carries us toward the meadow where we cross the creek once more and return home.

When winter comes, our morning walks don't end, but they are no longer a come-as-you-are tiptoe through the woods. They become a deep-sea dive into cold and dark, in a submersible of wool and down. Peeking out from under scarves and toboggans like diving helmets, we trudge heavily against the stern and biting currents of polar air that washes over us like waves. Without our bulky diving suits our frail pink flesh would turn blue and brittle as December leaves, and our expedition would never be heard from again.