New Year's Day

So now, dear reader, I am afraid that I truly have neglected you. The writing for my travelogue has been finished for a week; all that I need to do is add pictures, the easy part. I apologize and promise to have it to you before I go to Europe on the 17th of this month, but for now there is something which I wish to share with you:

My girlfriend, Cathy and I danced the New Year in down at Player's Pub, then came back here to the ranch. We finally got up some time mid to late morning and hung out, eating pancakes and drinking coffee in front of the open wood stove; watching the flames and talking between the silences. Come early afternoon we got ready to go out visiting. Before we left I thought it prudent to bring in a load of wood; better to do it then rather than later. I was getting the wheelbarrow ready when I noticed Cathy looking wistfully into the forest out back. Cate's been to my house several times but though we've talked about taking a walk in the woods we hadn't done so yet.

"C'mon," I said, and started walking toward the back of the property. I thought I'd take her to the edge of the ravine and then we'd get the wood and go, but I found myself explaining about how beautiful it had been before they cut the trees; took out the mature timber for profit. "They took the Mysterious Forest and left the pretty woods," I said, or something to that effect. So then I wanted to show her the gorgeous stand of Shagbark Hickory that they'd left, and hope completely forgot about. It was just down the hill aways. On the way I pointed out where I had once identified an endangered species of plant (wish I could remember what it was) that happened to be right in the lumber jacks' skidder path.

After the Hickorys I took her a little further down to see the ancient Beech. While this land has been nothing but forest since this part of the world was made it had been logged once before, back in the day when they used mules and muscle instead of diesel and two cycle engines. Someone had carved an image of a tree into the bark of this Beech, along with the words, "DO NOT CUT THIS TREE DOWN," and "YOU ARE NOT GOOD." The letters are wide and distorted after all the years of growth, but still plainly legible. "See," I said, "someone has loved this land long before I ever got here."

I wanted to show her more. I mean, hell, we were already halfway down the hill, why not go on? So we did, and with every destination I was drawn to go further. "There's a spring fed pond back there," I said, "but it's kind of far and we should leave it for another day." But, while still not planning to go to the pond we kept going further and further. Then I saw a sign ahead, sticking up right in the middle of the valley. I was dreading this. We were then further into the woods than I'd been in fifteen years, since I started driving a truck, though I used to walk it regularly. "I'll be damned if I'm going to honor any NO TRESPASSING signs," I said. "I've got grandfather rights!" I strode ahead defiantly. As I got closer I thought it didn't look like a simple no trespassing sign. Then I got closer yet and started dancing. SYCAMORE LAND TRUST!!! I don't have to win the lottery to protect that land anymore, it's already protected! "See," I said, "somebody else loves this land besides me."

So yes, you guessed it, we went all the way to the pond and were both glad that we did. The temperature when we'd left was only 25° but the sun was shinning and the sky clear blue. It was a beautiful day. There was a thin skim of ice on the the pond. Leaves would blow out there and dance and the sun sparkled off the surface. We must have sat there twenty minutes at least.

On the way back we picked up as much of the trash that washes down from the road as we could, and vowed to return for more later. Then came the great challenge: climbing back up the big hill. We made it, of course, but when we got to the house we found the front door standing wide open! The fire was still burning but so was the furnace, fighting back the cold. We rushed in to find all of our valuables still intact. We were just going to get some fire wood, after all.