Memento Mori

Memento Mori

I went for a walk in "my" woods today, where I had not been in over sixteen months because of the ticks. (I may have gone once in 2018.) I knew that the usual groomer of trails had been sick and noticed the quick deterioration of two of ten little bridges over trickles. There were no footprints, tire prints, snowshoe prints, not in mud or snow. There were fallen branches, ones that any previous passer-by would have easily lifted and tossed aside. So no one has been here. On the other side of the Forest Service land there is reportedly timbering going on.  I expected to come to the edge of it, but only barely heard chain saws at the farthest southern point before turning west. I have liked being one of the few - it is quite different to realise you have been the only for many months.

Nor any animals, though they may show soon.  No deer, no fox, no rabbit, no moose, no grouse. No bear or coyote, which live here but I do not see.  Few birds.

I stopped in to see the previous groomer and repairer, a pleasant man I had conversed with a few times when our paths crossed.  His wife answered the door and invited me in.  Within three sentences she had referred to him in the past tense.  So I should have done better at that, going and seeing him sooner. Steven Waldorf.