SITTIN’ IN THE WOODS—

Pausing for a little rest in the woods gets one closer to the things that really matter.

Take a gentle, deep breath of that oxygen-laden, cool air. Exhale slowly. Take another. Then, look around a bit.

Already; right there by my left foot is a tiny, brown frog. Or, is it a baby toad. Or a peeper. Unless you are very curious, it doesn’t really matter. I hope he is having a good day.

Then, over there in that brilliant patch of slanting sunlight a spider is constructing its web. Even now I can see it taking its marvelous geometric shapes as the silk sparkles against the dark woods.

Somewhere from the west comes the splattering sound of a woodpecker air-hammering a hollow branch in search of his breakfast. Further north a hawk squeals. I think he is celebrating his free-ride on the invisible escalator of a thermal current being generated by the morning’s already hot sun.

Now I hear a rustling high in the hickory tree. I watch carefully until a pudgy gray squirrel reveals himself leaping to his next favorite branch. I wonder if he will bother to recover the nuts he is dislodging that ricochet to the floor of the woods.

I haven’t seen a deer yet this morning, but, the game trail back there is showing lots of activity.

The bark less elm trunk just to my right appears to be hosting a convention of daddy long-leg spiders. I lean that way to examine them closely. The joints of their sprawling legs look arthritic and they display two different back designs in this gathering. I wonder if this reveals the males vs. the females. Hmmm.

Periodically my reverie is broken by the distant and muted racket of a human vehicle hurrying to get someplace down the county road.

I wonder if wherever they are going is as rewarding as my little spot in the woods.