05 Scenes From a Walk

Scenes from a walk…

… scenes from a walk…

… scenes from the walk into town from Southeast Lighthouse…

Southeast Lighthouse

… been under renovation for a few years now… supposed to reopen in July…

… the stairs at Mohegan Bluffs…

… for another day… an overlook…

… Southeast lighthouse… we’ll get there in a minute…

… a walk to the North Lighthouse this morning… a slow going trek around a crescent beach of loose sand and rocks… small steps most of the way…

… taking a break, sitting in the crook of a tree…

… turns out S and G are in Cannes, the film festival?… i may be jealous… i think of Haiku, which tell me everything you need is now, in this moment, what, then, is Cannes, relative to a Haiku?…

… Rodman’s Hollow…

… bird migration monitoring station…

… some shots from this morning’s walk…

… American Legion Post #36…

… first walk on BI… stop to rest my back…

…seen along the way…

… another stop along the way…

… Fishkill Creek and the Roundhouse… when we got here 15 years ago, the building was unused and deteriorated… it is now a high end restaurant and hotel… Beacon has held its own during the pandemic…

… walked to Bob’s Corner Store… there are benches in shade, hikers arrive in the parking lot to climb Mt. Beacon… this is the more arduous approach, i use the Pocket Road trail approach mostly known to locals… nicer walk, fewer people… an image of Mt. Beacon i made earlier on the walk…

… as i am walking i remember in this morning’s chapter of The Bell Jar, a picture of a woman is described, a black spot on her face, four months later she is dead it is explained… we are not told what it was but i know and i hurried on and tried to forget… i need a skin exam to be scheduled with my doctor, i am way overdue…

… i also thought that i need to rearrange my Z meeting with J, as we need to absentee vote today so it is done…

… i think that the expected rain has not materialized and the garden will need tending… i am glad we are setting up a watering system…

… the sounds of Fishkill Creek burble gurgle by… birds calling back and forth… i am alive in this moment…

… a shorter walk today… possible rain… pain in several places up and down my left side… nose tickling in a pre-sneeze way, allergies… i wonder about having an iPhone tripod… not this time, lots of money being spent… i think about the noise of rapids and waterfalls, did primitive humans avoid lingering near them because it is difficult to hear danger approaching?… it makes me nervous that way… i suppose one learns to position themselves in a spot where the rear is naturally protected… i watch the chaos of the rapids, water pounding through… i imagine the ocean pounding the shore in stormy weather… do i make this link because we will soon be at the shore?…

… i spend some time finding people to follow on micro.blog…

… an early start gets me to my Pocket Road trail perch by 07:30 AM… the climb is equivalent to 45 flights of stairs… i stop a couple of times to let my heart rate slow… i sit listening to the stream flowing over rocks and into pools, still unable to precisely describe the sound… hiss, burble, gurgle is the best i can do so far… the water snake slithers by… are all paths through the wood vestigial snakes?… ouroboros, i think no, they are more linear in nature, but then, i think my thinking is too narrow, that water falls on the mountain, flows down to the river, then to the sea, where it rises up to the sky and returns to the top of the mountain to start again… i think for a minute that the snake is always going clockwise, but what is wrong with starting at the mouth and following the arc to the tail?…

… sitting by Fishkill Creek, near the old bridge, almost halfway point on this particular walk route… strange, an earlier note deleted and replaced with a new one, somehow confused in the backing up exchange… a bird pecking away nearby, i can’t find it with my eyes… the sound of a branch falling through still attached branches in a tree, a large bird flapping off into the distance, two men walk by chatting, the creek burble-gurgles, birds twitter and call…

… it occurs to me that to write strong words one needs to feel strongly… it occurs to me that most of life is not felt strongly… to reflect life, write mostly the mundane sprinkled with crescendo moments… it isn’t all about the peaks and valleys…

… struggling to get reception, finally, when there are least bars, it comes… notable, a baby snapping turtle, Fiona finds a deer well before i see it, scented it i think… a bird chattering… the sound of the creek flowing by…

… the usual early morning bird singing loudly… cat wailing downstairs… coffee made… dogs let out then treated… slept through the night, feel groggy… contemplating what needs doing before leaving for BI… looking forward to it, always do… will look forward to going home, always do…

… the cursor blinks a questioning blink at me, what’s next?… i would like to compose a beautiful poem, i tell the blinking line… but then i type and the words flowing out are not beautiful, just regular as H would say when complimented on their beautiful self…

… what will make today successful?, catch up on my photography, make a good number of photographs, there have not been many over the past four or five days… interruptions, outside of routine visits to sister-in-laws and cousins… contact with family, hugs, wonderful, tiring drives…

… i track shipment of the new SPF 50 pants i bought, still in a kind of limbo, left the warehouse, not really on its way… i went with free shipping which saves money but leads to impatience… old fashioned anticipation…

… Pocket Road trail today… the climb is relatively easy, two stops to let my heart slow down, my health app tells me i have climbed the equivalent of 33 flights of stairs…

… the trees are well leafed out and it is dark at some points along the trail… the sounds of water as it flows over, around, under rocks… this stream of water comes from the reservoir up above… i am sitting about half way up, at the point where the trail crosses the stream, my stopping point most of the time… this is what is in front of me…

… i feel the happiness of a body that has exercised itself to the point of endorphin rush, satisfied that i can do it with relative ease… happy to be in the woods with only the sounds of the stream, birds, insects… so calming…