Through the mud puddle: Shadow Me contemplates the advance of fall; we find a junked car - a tiny blue man waves his stubby arm at us
Wednesday, August 29, 2012 at 12:33PM ;)
As all those who read yesterday's post are so painfully aware, I must now spend my weekdays, at least Monday through Thursday, alone without Margie and Lynxton. BUT - on sunny days, I do have Shadow Me to go walking with.
Yesterday was sunny and beautiful - one of the rare, sunny, warm, most beautiful, days of the entire summer. So, in the evening, between my mid-afternoon snack and dinner, I took off on a walk with Shadow Me. I tried to keep him out of the puddle, but he insisted on going in. Once there, he put his head in the leaves to show me the turn has now begun. There is still plenty of green in the trees, but more and more of the leaves are turning and soon the green will be all gone.
The summer of 2012 is truly the summer I missed.
And so did Shadow Me.
;)
A curious thing about Shadow Me is he can come out of a puddle completely dry, as if he had never entered it at all. So here he is, a very dry Shadow Me, matching me step for step.
And look! LOOK! I am wearing Levi's! I am not wearing my loose, baggy, belt-less pants that look like pajama bottoms - the sort of pants that were the only kind of pants I had worn since the day of my surgery until just a couple of days ago.
;)
This turned into the longest walk I have taken since my surgery - about 3.5 to four miles. In our early days here, we were surrounded by lightly trammeled woods. One could go in any direction from our house and just walk, mountain bike, or cross-country ski through the woods and I constantly did all three. Now, in all directions, there are still remnants of woods out there but there are hundreds and hundreds of houses that were not here then, and many subdivisions, and it is not an easy thing to find access into woods one can walk through - except maybe for a short distance.
One of the first places to get cut off was the hill and area between Tanaina Elementary and our subdivision. A trail led down the hill from Lucille Street and we had used it regularly. Then a house or two got planted in it towards the bottom and we had to give it up.
But the trail is still there and yesterday I walked by it. It remains a well-used trail, so I got to thinking maybe someone had tromped through, rolled through, cut through or in some other way made new trails to circumvent the houses that had appeared. I decided to explore and find out.
I was a bit nervous, because I did not want to wind up in the back yard of an angry, paranoid, person and find myself shot. The trail did, indeed, lead to a couple of back yards but before it got to them, new forks branched off elsewhere and I was, indeed, able to circumvent the houses, which might have been occupied by nice people who would not have shot me anyway, even though they probably would not have been thrilled if I had walked through their back yard.
Then again, they might have shot me, dug a hole and buried me along with the hundreds of bodies of the other people who innocently strolled into their back yards - you just never know.
;)
Back in the days when I could go in any direction and find myself in woods, I faced a couple of sources of irritation, one of which was the abandoned vehicles that continually appeared upon the trails - left there either by irresponsible dolts or by thieves who had stolen the vehicles and needed to get rid of them.
So now I find my way back into a small remnant of my old woods and this is what I find.
;)
I also found this guy - this tiny, blue, man with only one arm and it a stubby one, waving at me. Or maybe he was warning me: Stop! Go no further! You are bound to get shot!
No, he must have been waving. I went further. I found my way into the former swamp behind our home that has now dried into a meadow. Nobody took a single shot at me. Nobody even swore at me, or shook a fist.
The little blue man never said anything, which made his intention a bit tricky to determine, but I was glad to discover he was friendly. I entered the house from the back. Shadow Me came right to the door and then vanished.
Reader Comments (5)
I so love your whimsical posts!!! Thank you.
This made my evening. I will never look at an automobile seat the same way---ever.
Nancy - Good. I like whimsical - even when I am serious.
Annette - Well, then, I accomplished something!
Thank you both.
You MUST be feeling much better to go for such a long walk. Enjoyed seeing some of the things you passed by.
Take care.
I am a one time visitor to Wasilla. Hope to come back to Alaska sometime. An incredibly beautiful state.
Yes, Francesca - I am feeling SO much better.