Sunday, January 1, 2012

There and Back Again

1. New York greets us with blowing snow and darkening skies. She is in character for my return and I dream out the window of skating on frozen ponds and sledding down snow covered hills.
2. The old furnace has been softly rumbling on for sixty winters. At night I can hear it through my pillow, as familiar and comforting as a mother's heartbeat to her child's ear.
3. Her appetite is coaxed back to health with some good, home cooking.
4. By the end of the week the freezer is full of foil wrapped meals, neatly labeled in large block letters identifying the contents.
5. Large dairy farms dot the southern Pennsylvania landscape. Each huge barn is a different design and each farmhouse a testament to years of hard working families. Many of them incorporate a light colored stone in house and barn, making them appear invincible to time.
6. On the highway, we pass the startling scene of an accident only minutes old. People are running from vehicles toward a rolled-over car to help out. Dozens of them frantically swarm around it, tossing baggage aside to free the occupants. While the scene itself is horrific, my throat tightens at the goodness of humanity and the nature of man to run toward danger to help one another.
7. Our beloved mountains. They are not mine by ancestry, but they have adopted me in and I love to see them as we near our Virginia home.

5 comments:

  1. I ran across an accident like that in the Blue Ridge mountains last year - a van load of people hit a motorcyclist coming around a sharp mountain road curve. The same thing happened - everyone pitched in to help to get the occupants (all senior citizens) out of the van and kept the motorcyclist warm (his legs were clearly broken and he was in shock.)

    Happy new year, Leonora - lots of journeying for you last week, sounds like and it's lovely that you went to help out.

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  2. Welcome back! I missed your words while you were gone. Happy New Year to you and yours.

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  3. our seascape has adopted me ... i understand this post

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  4. I love mountains. Me and my dad used to go hiking in the Alleghenies all the time :)

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  5. I once passed on accident on a highway in Maine as the body bag was slipped on the deceased. Those images stay with you for a long time--make you slow down a bit.

    Sounds like you had a wonderful holiday season. Having traveled through your beloved mountains many times, I understand how you feel. ;)

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