SUNLIGHT AND SHADOW

Black Swallowtail nectering on Musk Thistle.

Bright sun this morning, and already 86˚F.  A welcome change, though the day's forecast calls for a 40% chance of showers. Which will probably happen as there's a gusty shifting to the wind, which my seat-of-the-pants Ohio weather experience says is typically a harbinger of soon to come storms.

I'm thinking of taking a long drive. I have no real destination in mind…just somewhere out in the country, away from here, following the friendly backroads by whim and fancy. Aimless vehicular wandering. Escape.

I need to get away. Last night I learned an old friend and fellow writer died a couple of weeks ago. His passing had been reported by various news outlets and media sites, yet I somehow missed it. Complications following a stroke was the given cause. Though he was a few years my senior, he was still too young—too vital. Or so we always like to tell ourselves; death pays no mind to such trivial considerations. 

This is a fellow who roamed the world in search of adventure, wrote dozens of books, thousands of magazine articles and columns. A guy I admired and respected, whom I've known for more than three decades. A man of quite honor, a gentleman, and something of a mentor. From the moment we met in a hotel elevator in Macon, Georgia, he treated me as an equal, though I was just starting out in the business and he was already at the peak of the profession—widely published, avidly sought by top editors. 

Yet we hit it off immediately. Kindred spirits. We shared a passion for fishing, book collecting, photography, and rattling around two-tracks through the remote jackpine wilds of the upper Great Lakes. A few weeks later he called and asked if I'd do research for a regional section of a book on mayflies he was authoring. Later, when I delivered my material, he and his wife insisted I stay a few days as their house guest. I've never been treated better or made to feel more welcome. And it proved to be only the first of a number of similar extended visits.

Over the years we talked regularly by phone, exchanged letters and books, traded tips on writing and photography and various publishing issues. We fished together. And we got to know one another on a deeply personal level. Genuine friends. Which makes it so inexplicable why, over the last decade or so, we somehow lost touch, drifted our own ways. He retired, I had some health issues…but still?

All I know is that I'm deeply saddened by my old pal's unexpected and untimely passing. And I truly miss him.   

SUNDAY SAD

The river this morning…

It is chilly along the river today—just now, a few minutes past noon, making it above fifty degrees. The weatherman claims we'll mange sixty, but I'm not convinced given his recent track record. At least it is not raining, as it has been for the past few days.

Yesterday a friend came by in and we went out for a couple of hours on a photo excursion. The temperature had been dropping all morning, plus there was intermittent drizzle, and when he got here after a morning at the office, he was already cold, having not left home before his half-day's work with sufficient outerwear. I loaned him an extra insulated field coat and even with that, he never quite got thawed out.

But we made some nice photos, I think—in spite of the cold, damp, dimness.

Today there's sun…so maybe the weatherman's prediction will prove true after all. I hope so. But if not, there's a nice fire crackling on the hearth, plus I've just taken a couple of loaves of pumpkin-spiced carrot and walnut bread from the oven. In a few minutes I'll cut a few slices from one of the still-warm loaves, top with a bit of the cream cheese maple-syrup, cinnamon spread I mixed up last evening for a different bread we had with our late supper, and then I'll sit before the fire awhile with a cup of coffee and my bread.

The yard is full of leaves, most of which fell on Friday during the rain and wind. Eventually they'll get raked into narrow rows and gone over a few passes with the lawnmower. Then, mixed with a bit of topsoil, I'll deploy the excellent mulch around plants and beds.

Some leaves still remain, and they're heartbreakingly beautiful lit by the strong sunlight. The river pours along like molten jade. It is a good day here…or it would be except that yesterday morning a man I knew and liked died suddenly. He'd gone into the laundry room to retrieve some towels from the dryer. His wife heard him fall. He was probably gone when he hit the floor.

Too young to die, being in his fifties. Which, of course, is not true. Young or old, right or poor. Such details are meaningless. We never know when and where death will find us. But it always does, and we always must go.

Walt was a good and decent man. Kind, generous, thoughtful. This world would be a far better place if there were more like him around. Men who think of others before themselves. Men who greet you with a word and smile. Alas, there's now one fewer…

I usually try and answer all post comments on the day they're received. Yesterday I failed, and I apologize. But after my photographer friend left, and the night closed in, I simply couldn't write. I hope that's okay, hope you understand, will overlook and forgive my lapse.

Last night all I could do was sit quietly before the fire….