VALLEY AND OTHER

The sun filters down through the trees and marries the moss here and there or else touches rocks. There are trees grand and old that have fallen over into the valley and what strikes one most is their root systems. These once secret under the earth labyrinthine systems now also accepting, against their will for a time I suppose,- the air and sun and other. Crickets or beetles live under them, and perhaps some snakes or frogs and other things. Some of the roots still have dirt that clings like a half forgotten dream and some are bleached, flaxen from the sun and long exposure to the air. Looking up, I thought I should take stock of my surroundings now and again, to know where I was, to mark the land there in my mind. There was nobody around and then someone’s dog and one of mine sniffed or saw one another. The other dog was far and far up on the summit,- and someone called it, Coco, to come back. My dog disappeared in that direction, and then reappeared, so fast and full of prowess is he, about a half kilometre back to me, and up a steep incline at that, in what was just a matter of short minutes. He watched me, and did not sit down, for he never sits,- and was not out of breadth. I and he and the other dog walked out of the valley and it took some time and care for the owner to traverse the steepness. Yet, if you go intentionally slow, and zig-zag, and watch your step as you say,- you can, as in life sometimes,- make it. When we were away from the valley floor with its root systems and quietness we were still in the larger forest. Birds flew overhead. Some stayed nearer, but ducked away into the mysterious thickness that the dense trees made. I inhaled the fresh air and slowly began to feel a bit better for I had a cold, and fatique, and a poor nights sleep. The autumn there, and around, but especially there, is revitalizing and practically a cure all. We sauntered along the paths. We were normal for ourselves, par for the course, - the course of our morning and day, the course of the season that had gracefully set itself upon us once more.