A Short Excursion

I went down to the lake yesterday in the mild and gray late afternoon. It’s an easy half-a-mile walk from our house on Grenada Street. Down the steep hill where cars will be slipping and sliding in the snow in a few weeks. Right onto the short and profusely puddled dirt road with the extravagant name ‘Tiverton Parkway’. By the humming and slightly ominous but well-landscaped power sub-station. Then right onto Tory Fort Lane, a woodsy well-paved dead-end road with no fort, Tory or otherwise, anywhere to be seen for the last quarter-mile. The dirt road leading off to the left to the lake is gated and marked with ‘Private Property’ signs. But the lake itself is owned by Worcester Conservation Trust and everyone knows its fine to walk there.

Walking the few hundred yards to the lake on the flat road through the trees, I like to pretend I’m in Vermont. While I know Vermont is just another state, albeit a beautiful one, and that living there in the green mountains is the same as living anywhere else—the ten thousand joys and sorrows—in my mind, it’s a place of beauty and ease. So many childhood summers, when the family was together and the only obligations were made up on the spot.

That’s the state I enter as I amble alone in the falling afternoon light. I pass a mother and teen-age daughter out walking their large black dog who is much more interested in sniffing than in walking. All I smell is the sweet dampness of the lake and the fallen leaves beginning to decompose, but I know the dog with his rich black nose is appreciating a symphony of notes in an olfactory landscape which is beyond my meager senses.

When I get to the lake, it’s just me. I wander off the main trail to a spit of wooded land between an inlet and another small pond. It’s quiet. No wind and no people. The surface of the lake is smooth and the pine trees are still as I walk down to the edge of the water. Crouching down I settle into stillness for a few moments.

Two mallard duck couples swim together in the late afternoon. Nothing else moves. I reach my hands out over the lake like I’m warming myself by a fire. Why is it that we humans love water in all its forms? Is it the ancient memories of the safety of being in proximity to this primal necessity? Is it the water in my body that feels a kinship with it’s larger family?

I don’t know, but I enjoy a moment of intimacy with these particular waters. I dip my fingers in the cold water and then touch them to my forehead. After a few moments, my legs tire of the crouch and time calls me onward. Standing up, I retrace my steps on the empty streets, avoiding the puddles and happy for my Vermont excursion right here in Worcester.