The last fruits of summer and a bit of Frost

As the fog lifted I headed toward the local park to explore the trails along the river. I wandered around thinking to myself about the great blue sky, the changing leaves and everything that has happened over the last few months. The smell of nature all around me was intoxicating. My miniature camera took pictures of everything, but later as I reviewed them, the pictures seemed less impressive without all of those intermingling scents or the feeling of sun on my face.

I spent hours there walking only a portion of the miles and miles of trails. At one point as I stood there about to choose between branching paths, that Robert Frost poem I had to memorize in 8th grade came back to me about two roads in a yellow wood. Unlike Frost, I did not stop to question what was down that untaken trail, knowing well I would return that way another day to trample upon the leaves strewn there. Instead, I eagerly chose the path muddy and lined with blackberry brambles. Unconcerned for the remote and unpopulated location I might have skipped a step or two, but there were no witnesses. Also unwitnessed was my tasting of blackberries straight from the vine. Some raced tart to my brain and others, in a slow sweet memory of summer, carried me off to other delicious blackberry remembrances. I shuffled my feet through the leaves to hear that glorious sound crinkling and crackling, longing for a rake to create a giant leaf pile. On that path where anything could have happened, I left behind shoulders strained with worry and a heart full of indecision.

As one hour turned to two, and two to three, I returned to a happy place. Not wanting to lose that euphoria of summer blackberries, dragonflies close enough to touch, gaggles of geese in flight overhead, the strong smell of crab apples growing along one trail, or the landscape festooned with autumn colors, I walked on. When finally my muscles began to betray fatigue, I returned to my little old car.

My happiness was tinted with loneliness though. After an amazing yet ordinary adventure the only one who would remember it was me. And that was one road I rather not be taking. But sometimes, as Frost suggests, we'd miss out on the unique experiences that brought us to this point and stage in our lives if we had taken another road. So I'll eat my blackberries where I find them; I'll stop to smell wild pears along the road; and I'll wonder at the strange animal slithering against the river's current, because there is no point in denying ourselves real moments of happiness just because we believe life might have been better down a different hypothetical road.