A walk in the woods

This morning dawns cool and overcast. I breathe a sigh of relief. I don’t like the heat and humidity that creeps into everything here in New England. Perhaps, all those years living in the Pacific Northwest have allowed me to develop a propensity to enjoy a nice, grey day.

Don’t get me wrong. I love the sun, vitamin D, and the way it can instantly revive the soul after weeks of rain. Yet, I find myself growing antsy with two many days of sun in a row and relieved to wake up to a cool, grey day.

This morning, I am preparing to meet my dad at Walden Pond for a belated father’s day walk in the woods. Though this walk may bear little resemblance to Thoreau’s perambulations, I am excited for a taste of the unknown. What birds will we find and evidences of spring turning to summer?

If you open your heart and mind—the greatest senses of all—to your surroundings, wherever you may be, you may be comforted and pleasantly surprised by what you discover. Just yesterday, I noticed an Eastern Phoebe take flight from a fence post along the Merrimack Canal in downtown Lowell. I nearly shrieked in response. Ok, I definitely shrieked and also yelled out the bird’s name, most certainly causing it to take flight and flee from downtown Lowell. I hope it comes back.

Daffodils

I wandered lonely as a cloud
That floats on high o’er vales and hills,
When all at once I saw a crowd,
A host, of golden daffodils;
Beside the lake, beneath the trees,
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.

Continuous as the stars that shine
And twinkle on the milky way,
They stretched in never-ending line
Along the margin of a bay:
Ten thousand saw I at a glance,
Tossing their heads in sprightly dance.

The waves beside them danced; but they
Out-did the sparkling waves in glee:
A poet could not but be gay,
In such a jocund company:
I gazed–and gazed–but little thought
What wealth the show to me had brought:

For oft, when on my couch I lie
In vacant or in pensive mood,
They flash upon that inward eye
Which is the bliss of solitude;
And then my heart with pleasure fills,
And dances with the daffodils.

~ William Wordsworth