new growth

Late afternoon, I found myself in an old growth forest, untouched since Revolutionary War soldiers settled in the area.  Less than two miles from the home Rich and I shared for 23 years, I never knew it existed.


But my new hiking partner knows just about every trail, most of them unmarked, and despite leaving with 13 fresh mosquito bites -- the buzz away spray was left in the car -- I was enchanted.  By the 150-foot trees, rare oak and hemlock and hickory; by the silence, except for a bluejay or two; by a new awareness of previously unknown territory, even though I drove past this patch a thousand times or two.


As we stretch out on blankets pulled from his backpack and look up, he says hey, wouldn't they be fun to climb?


I'm from Brooklyn, I say.  We don't climb trees in Brooklyn.  And I never looked up much because there's not much sky to see.


But, hey, I can still grow.


Candace