My modified family took a walk last week.
Our oldest, a son, grew up and got married.
But we are still five, we've just added another female to take his place. Not the same.
She smells much better. But I digress.
Smell -- have you ever noticed that smells are huge memory triggers?
We walked through a park that is designated as a "wild prairie" and the "wild flowers" and/or weeds as some call them are about mid-thigh high. (If you are 5'2" like certain individuals who choose to remain nameless.) Not that we actually walked through them -- Iowa is known for chiggers -- if you don't know what those are, be grateful.
As we walked through the patch I was instantly transported back to my bean-walking days. Bean-walking -- oh my -- I don't know that it gets any better than that. A person wakes before dawn to get a good start. Water jugs, filled with tepid water at the end of endless rows of moist green leaves, dirt and bugs, the only reward for a job well done. Literally, bean-walking is a stroll through a bean-field ridding it of weeds. Good times. Oh, and a laborer got a whole $2.75 an hour when I had the privilege.
Next, after the girls squealed past us on their roller blades, we hit a stand of pine trees, and I mentally revisited Colorado. The sharp pine bouquet eclipsed the bean-field earthiness and bloomed into a mountain setting. I thought of many early mornings I've spent in Colorado. Stepping out the cabin door and sucking in the beauty of the awakening mountain sense-fest as the sun creeps over the range.
Then the squealing of the girls and the rumble of their skates across the bridge snapped me back to reality. And reality is a pretty nice place to be, too.
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