good morning Hank it's Tuesday it's
early spring here in Indiana and I like
being outside at the moment life today
feels so vastly different than it did
just a few weeks ago and my aamna
directional anxiety is often
overwhelming so I thought maybe we could
just go outside and take a walk together
outside the world continues apace the
honeysuckle a wildly successful invasive
species here in the Midwest has begun to
leaf out the deer and coyotes have made
a nice game trail through the clover for
me to follow the Sycamore branches are
still bare splitting the sky above me
into irregular polygons this view always
reminds me of an Annie Dillard line I'm
sitting under a sycamore by tinker Creek
I am really here alive on this intricate
earth under trees there's something
about looking up at tree branches that
allows me to feel that I am really here
alive on this intricate earth which is
one of my favorite things to feel as we
walk a bit further we come to a little
creek that will dry up in summer but for
now is just burbling away actually hold
on let's just listen for a second
that's one of my favorite sounds the
sound of water on the move this little
stream will flow into the White River
which right now is a muddy flooded
cacophony in a dry summer I can walk
across this section of river without
ever getting my shorts wet but for now
it's 30 feet deep and churning from here
the White River will flow into the
Wabash River which will flow into the
Ohio which will flow into the great
Mississippi River and then into the Gulf
of Mexico even after that of course the
water will just keep going freezing and
melting and evaporating and raining and
flowing and being neither created nor
destroyed which is a thought I find
deeply comforting but back at the creek
the water flows clear and steady and I
think about a line from Leanne shaft uns
book swimming studies water is elemental
it's what we're made of what we can't
live within or without if we walk down
the Creek a little while eventually we
arrived at a swampy floodplain where
early flowers are in bloom including
these little beauties known as glory of
the snow I think of the Wordsworth poem
lines written in early spring where he
talks about believing as an article of
faith that every flower enjoys the air
it breathes if you have to have a faith
and I do that seems like a good one
let's walk for just a little longer
I feel calmer now than when I started
walking I don't feel like calm but I do
feel calmer I know the feeling won't
last nothing does but I'm grateful for
it anyway
now that I'm feeling a little calmer
it's easier to have thoughts if that
makes any sense my brain isn't swirling
and spinning as much it's less like the
flooded White River and more like the
little stream that feeds it for some
reason I think about this Lucille
Clifton poem that ends the future is
possible
I feel hope in there the future is
possible I look up again and I take a
long breath and I enjoy the air I am
breathing you are really here alive on
this intricate earth under trees Hank
I'll see you on Friday